


Childhood, but they're throwing rocks at you.

by MagnusOpum



Series: Harry's Descent [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Abuse, Alcoholism, Childhood Sexual Abuse, Complete, Dissociation, Explicit Language, Extreme Vulgarity, Graphic, Harry is just trying to exist, Homophobic Slurs, Marital Issues - I guess, Paedophilia, Prequel, Rape, References to Rape of OC, Sexual Assault, Suicidal Themes, Suicide Attempt, repost
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:34:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 47,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27589613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagnusOpum/pseuds/MagnusOpum
Summary: Don't test your limits, a hardened jaded world-weary Harry Potter would warn his younger self if he ever had the chance. Be content, he would caution a hungry little boy trapped in a cupboard. For it can get worse and some men are monsters - don't test your luck.OrHurt or be hurt.OrThey're blindOrThe powers that be, you see_this is the first installment of the darkness series
Series: Harry's Descent [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2016805
Comments: 9
Kudos: 17





	Childhood, but they're throwing rocks at you.

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: so, this is a repost of a completed fic (wrote it from 2018-2019) that I orphaned after deleting my previous fanfic account. Probably not going to edit it, even though the chapters can differ in style. Just a plain, unedited repost for those who've already read it. 
> 
> My new method of posting is to finish each installment completely before posting, so it will be a while before this series is updated. Each installment will be complete, so idk if you can bookmark a series or not, but the series is what will be updated. This individual fic is complete. 
> 
> Please read the tags, this story involves a lot of explicit child abuse from the child's p.o.v. and suicidal ideation.

**Chapter One.**

“FREAK!”

Uncle Vernon backhanded him sharply, flinging Harry down to the ground, making the tiny boy bite his tongue to stop from yelling out. His uncle never liked it when he cried; he always hit him harder then. Harry cowered in fear, curling up on the ground, flinching violently away from him. He was red in the face and sweating like a pig, his eyes wide, and neck artery throbbing madly... almost as madly as his rage. Harry squished himself into the corner, trying to make himself seem small, fear coursing like blood through his veins.

“How DARE you PRACTICE SUCH FREAKISHNESS?! I LOST MY BEST CLIENT, YOU DEVIL'S CHILD! A WEEK in the cupboard. NO FOOD. NO LIGHT. NO. MORE. FREAKISHNESS!”

Harry quickly scrambled away and flung himself into his cupboard, ignoring his aching side from falling, or bleeding face from the cut of his uncle's wedding ring. It wasn't deep, and it hadn't been as bad as normal, but a week in the cupboard... That was a long time. A long, lonely, time which Harry had come to dread, almost as much as the bruises on his back. He would almost... almost trade a week in the cupboard for a 'good hiding', of course he would never say such a thing out loud.

He lied back onto the dirty mattress, pulling the threadbare blanket over him, and stared at the ceiling with the small light coming through the cracks of the door. That light would soon be gone too, and he would be left alone in the cupboard, his only company the occasional spiders which he would flick off of him, the dust pouring down from the ceiling, the bucket (smelling ripe as always) and the muffled sounds he would strain to hear through the door.

Black. Dark.

Something ached in his heart as he was immersed in the complete blackness.

It was almost like the flick of a switch, but Harry knew it wasn't. He knew it was the towel 'we are wasting on your sorry ass' pinned up in front of the door so he wouldn't have such a basic need as light. And god he missed it. He could spend minutes with his eyes open thinking they were closed, hours thinking he was asleep when he was awake, days only accompanied by the grumbles of his belly, and a week... an awful lonely soul-tearing week limited to only darkness.

As he was first submerged in the darkness his breath came out short and panicked, as it always started. Then he would hear the

“Quit your noise, freak!”

from the other room and he would hold his breath, hoping beyond hope that he could hold it long enough to fall unconscious. He had never been able to before, self preservation always kicked in, seeming to think dust-filled air, that made him cough a number, was better than no air at all. But Harry wished for sleep. For his dreams were better than the darkness that sunk into his very bones, that sunk behind his eyes, and all he could see was... nothing. A terrifying thing that had him crying silent tears.

But he took a breath. Closed his eyes. Took another breath. And thought to himself that it could have been much worse. It could have been so much worse. Harry thought about all those people worse off that he had heard about before. All those people living in Africa, starving to death. All those people with their whole family dying in wars, or being murdered by some psycho, or... dying in a car crash, like his parents. All those people who were... raped, or touched, or violated, and his problems didn't seem so bad when he thought about them. How he got to go to school. And he had a family. And he only starved for a week or so. And he was only beaten, no one ever touched him like that.

It was only darkness. Only bruises. Only hunger pains. And it could have been worse.

Yet he still wished for sleep. And light. And food. And maybe... just maybe... he had a heartbreaking tiny hope for love. For someone to whisk him away and save him. For someone to feed him and tell him that the Dursleys were wrong and he wasn't really a freak and... and...

It was a bad idea to hope.

Hope never helped. Never. Never. And as he lay there in his darkness, wincing to himself as he leaned on his injured side the wrong way, he couldn't help but wonder why this was happening to him, as he often wondered. What he had done to deserve this? Were they right? Was he truly a freak? Harry seemed to remember, deep in his mind, that long long ago he lived somewhere different from here and he had been loved. Perhaps his drunkard father did love him, and his prostitute mother... maybe she was a prostitute for him, because she loved him, and because she needed money for him. For cribs and clothes and food. It was probably expensive. And... Harry could accept them for all their faults because they loved him, and they didn't mean to die in a car crash. No one meant to die in a car crash.

Did they?

So... he was lovable. He thought. He had once been loved. By his parents with many faults. He couldn't understand why the Dursleys treated him so differently to Dudley. He wasn't really that different. Okay, he was smarter. He did better in school, even if he had only been going for two years. He was better at cooking and gardening, but that was because Dudley never did it. And... what was wrong with him? He was... short? But that wasn't his fault. And there were other short people that Aunt Petunia held in high esteem. He was... quiet? That was only because no one wanted him to talk. He knew how to talk. He... he often got in trouble, but that was because Dudley always framed him. He...

Harry wasn't sure.

What he did know was that he wasn't what they wanted. There was something about him that they didn't like. And as he layed there listening to the muffled sounds of his uncle's drunken laughter, he wondered absently if that made him bad. He could only wonder if the Dursleys were... wrong? Because... they didn't like his parents, because they were freaks, and criminals, and prostitutes, and drunkards, but Harry still liked them. So... did that mean... it couldn't possibly... but...

Could he like himself even if they didn't like him?

He had to pause for a moment. Take a deep breath. That... He hadn't thought that before. Because all his life he had grown up being called a freak, had only just started thinking of himself as 'Harry', and had always agreed with what they said because... that was just how things were. But if... if they didn't like his parents and he did, that meant that... possibly... that they didn't like him and he could.

Harry had to take another breath. Maybe he was falling falling falling of the face of the Earth for thinking something so... out there, because he certainly felt a bit dizzy and he didn't think it was the starvation. He absently flicked a spider off of his leg, and closed his eyes, realising they were open. He... could... like himself. He could. That was right. He could. He was a freak, but he could still like himself anyway. He could like himself. He could stop blaming himself and start... what? What could he do? What did he need to do?

That first night Harry pondered over all of it. All he had been doing. All he could be doing. He decided he did like himself, for who he was, but apparently other people didn't. So, he came up with a plan. To lock his true self deep away inside, where no one would ever see it, with all his hopes and dreams and that thought that 'he once was loved', and he could be what they wanted him to be. He would be what they wanted, whilst still being himself, and they would treat him better because of it.

That second night he didn't think he had locked away enough of himself. Sure, his true self, hopes and dreams were good, but he was still scared and angry and overly emotional. So he made a mask. His very first mask. And his mask not only covered up his locked up box of true self, but also spanned over everything he was thinking. Making his face blank and unemotional. Hiding himself.

That third night, as he greedily chugged down the water that had been given to him, and ignored the slight hunger pains (he had had worse), he thought of what people might want him to be. And every night after that he did the same, he planned, and plotted, and schemed, and conjured up a variety of different ideas. Thinking about what people would want from him, and how he could forfill that.

When he was let out of the cupboard at the end of that week, he was a changed boy, seven years old and ready to take on the world. But no one in the house knew that. And as Harry acted as he always acted, doing exactly what his aunt ordered as he was hosed down in the garden, no one noticed anything.

Although, his aunt thought to herself that he looked especially evil that day, when he was eating his dry toast, but that was what she always thought. She would never know that, on that day, she had been on the right track.

-o-

The next year was certainly different to his last years. Instead of simply taking things as they came, accepting all that hit him (metaphorically and literally), Harry started to use his plan.

First at school. As a test run.

On his second grade teacher.

Mrs. Willock had always had something against him, most of the teachers did, after the Dursleys had constantly spouted off about how he was a 'trouble child'. Apparently, and Harry had been shocked the first time he heard this, he was a compulsive liar, who refuses to wear good clothes, and is constantly making trouble and passing the blame to his cousin. Harry often breaks things around the house, and we have caught him bullying Dudley and other neighbourhood kids into handing over money, homework and other valuables. We just don't know what to do!

So his teacher thought he was a cheat, liar and general nuisance. Every year he had gone to school he had been given suspicious looks, extra detentions, and many 'chats'. The first was by his teacher when he had just started Kindergarten, he was shy and quiet, and he had questioned Harry if things were 'okay at home'. Harry had of course told him about the beatings, cupboard, chores and Dudley's bullying and the teacher had called The Dursleys.

Harry started to learn that perhaps it wasn't just the Dursleys who were stupid. Maybe all adults?

The Dursleys had warned him of his compulsive lying, 'he does it for attention', and his teacher had given him a long talk about not saying lies about such wonderful guardians. He had then been called in again that year saying he needed to wear 'proper attire'. Harry pleaded for proper clothes, and the teacher yet again said that his relatives had given him good clothes but he 'refused to wear them'.

Harry had been confused, and slightly frightened of this teacher, and any other adults for that matter.

In his next year, the teacher had been an elderly woman, hearing about his 'nasty behaviour' from his aunt in person. She was a personal acquaintance and often played bingo down at the local pub, as did Aunt Petunia. Miss 'call me Miss I'm not married' Jenkins was quite a nice teacher. With most of the class. She treated Harry like scum of the Earth, making many references to what he now understood as racism, graffiti and property damage. She thought he was a white supremacist (at six years old) who drew many rude signs across the neighbourhood.

Were all the adults demented? Idiots? Crazy?

Well... you could never trust adults, that was for sure.

This year their teacher was a very young, blonde haired woman, who quite liked children. Although was certain Harry was cheating. Since he sat next to Amanda Young, the 'smartest' girl in class. Harry actually did better on tests, and homework, and questions, but everyone was sure he was cheating somehow. Someone had even suggested he cheated off of Dudley!

Harry had, of course, with childish naivety denied all accusations, and felt very sad that nobody liked him, and angry that they could think he would cheat when he really spent a lot of time in the library studying.

Now he realised it was the wrong approach altogether. He needed to be what people wanted. So they would believe him and treat him better in the long run. So the next time he went to school, after handing in a note to the office saying how he had been sick for the week with flu and that was why he hadn't been at school (also explaining why he was so pale and sickly looking, not like he had been living in a cupboard for a week or anything), he stayed after class.

She looked at him warily, as if he was about to attack her or something, and gestured for him to take a seat, pulling out two chairs and sitting on one herself.

“Mr. Potter... what can I... help you with?”

Harry sat down on the chair, wondering how to act like a hooligan. Should he look grouchy or something? He settled for crossing his arms over his chest 'defensively', and looking up at her through his bangs, hoping to look younger. He sniffed, hoping he wasn't overplaying it,

“I... I just... Miss?”

Mrs. Willock sighed and said softly, showing her child loving nature,

“Yes... Harry?”

Harry frowned for a moment, contemplating smiling or something like that, before he began his planned speech, adding in stutters so it didn't sound rehearsed,

“Have you... have you ever wanted someone to be... p... proud of you?”

Then he glanced at the ground shyly, tugging at his shirt, and trying to make a blush appear on his cheeks. Could you even do that? He would have to research it. He saw her look a little shocked, not something he really ever saw on an adult, and then quickly calm herself,

“Of course I have. Why?”

Harry tugged harder at his shirt, hoping she would believe him. He knew she liked children, and he hoped that she wanted him to be some misunderstood kid who just acted out for attention. By her almost pleased look he thought he was correct.

“Well...”

He said in a small voice, taking a deep breath as if to share some big secret,

“Well... you know how I'm... uh... adopted... How my guardians are... my... aunt and uncle... not... my parents?”

Mrs. Willock shook her head, a sympathetic look on her face. Harry hated sympathy.

“No, I didn't.”

Harry tugged again on his shirt, almost wincing when he heard a small rip. Its all for the cause. Its all for the cause.

“I...”

He trailed off, looking up at her, and giving her a nervous expression. She smiled at him, the nicest smile she had ever given him. Good god it was working! Harry refrained from jumping for joy. She was being nice to him. She liked him. Him! But then he squashed down those thoughts, she was only being nice because he was pretending to be someone he wasn't. She wasn't really being nice.

“Go on, Harry.”

She even seemed more confident using his name. Like she did all the other children. Like he was another child. There was a certain sort of rush he got deceiving her, and surprisingly no guilt, because she hadn't been nice when he told the truth. Why tell the truth? Honesty was simply painful.

“I just... I want my... family to be proud of me. Don't you know? You... you said that you want... people to be... proud, too. And Dudley... they... they love him more... and hug him more... and praise him more... and they. I don't... think they like me. Aunt Petunia... I... care about her. What she thinks. And... she's always telling... people how bad I am... like she's ashamed... And I...”

Harry sniffed to himself, ducking his head. Seeing pity and a tad of guilt on his teacher's face. Perfect.

“I... don't like to be... bad. I... just... do you understand? I don't... mean to... I just... want them... to... do you get it? I wanted... to be like Dudley... He has so many friends... and he does so well on his homework and tests... I just... want them to care. And I... do try... and I... want to be proud of myself... and I... was... I was... wondering... if maybe...”

Harry ducked his head again, shyly. She looked downright sad now, as if she had failed her duty as a teacher. She placed a 'comforting' hand on his shoulder, and Harry had to dig deep within himself to stop from flinching. Mrs. Willock said in a very soft and gentle voice,

“Go on, Harry, it was very brave to admit what you have. You can ask it.”

He looked back up, and said in the shiest voice he could manage,

“Would you... help me get better at school? On my... own? Without... cheating... or anything?”

She smiled a bright, happy, pleased smile and Harry knew, right then, that his plan was possibly the most brilliant plan he had ever come up with. Better than when he was honest. Better than when he tried his best. Did his worst. Acted like Dudley (boy had that gone badly). Tried to make friends.

This plan. This plan was amazing.

After that it was all smiles, extra homework, praises and gentle prodding. Harry was actually around the smarts for the next grade up, but he didn't let her know that, letting her buy into her own delusions that he used to be a compulsive liar, trouble-maker extraordinaire, and now he was reformed. It made her feel better, and it helped him in gaining a better reputation at school.

He was also believed when his exam results started reaching a nice height. 'C's of course. He wouldn't want to test the bounds too much, and he did his own studying anyway, outside of Mrs. Willock's extra-curricular studying times. Harry supposed it helped him revise things he already knew, and work on his manipulation skills. She also told him a lot that she was 'proud' of him, and Harry thought he was starting to become addicted to her kindness and praise. A small part inside of him was jumping for joy that somebody liked him, and that was proud of him. That part of him was locked away with his thought that 'he was lovable', so as not to be destroyed at a later date when it all inevitably came crashing down around him.

Harry couldn't afford to be heartbroken, life was a game of survival, there was no room for emotional breakdowns. At least not while he was out of his cupboard.

After the successful escapade with his teacher, Harry thought the next person to analyse would be Dudley. He would quite like not to be physically harassed outside the home as well as inside, as he was guaranteed to be courtesy of his uncle. He needed a reprieve sometime or he would never get anything done, although he was extremely quick at dodging blows now. Something he wasn't sure whether to be proud or ashamed of, even if it was a handy skill in fights, Harry didn't like that he needed the skill in the first place.

When thinking about what Dudley wanted from him he came to a startling conclusion. Dudley didn't want Harry to fear him, not like Uncle Vernon did (he didn't dare start there for fear he would mess up his manipulations and end up dead). Dudley wanted Harry to respect him and his power, and his friends, and... shockingly... to like him. At least that was what Harry thought. He wasn't sure how he was going to manipulate Dudley into being his 'friend' but it was certainly something to try out.

Harry thought it would be a long time project.

He put it to the side for a while, thinking that he would simply treat Dudley with more respect in their interactions, maybe look a tiny bit fearful, and cut back on the insulting comments. Harry didn't even know how he could have been stupid enough to insult Dudley, because his cousin could easily go to Uncle Vernon and then Harry would be in big trouble. But, Dudley never did, he just didn't seem smart enough to realise that his uncle wouldn't care that Dudley treated him like shit, because his uncle did as well. He might even be proud, and wasn't that a nice sentiment?

Aunt Petunia was the next person he analysed. She was very... pompous. She liked to think a lot of herself. And liked to think she was better than everyone else. So Harry slowly built up the courage to say something without prompt, a dangerous thing to do. He waited until Uncle Vernon had gone to work, looking up at her through the window, as he gardened. It was his favourite chore, mostly because of the fresh air. She had an eagle eye on him always, making sure he didn't slack off 'like his layabout father'.

Harry said thoughtfully, and very sincerely,

“Have I ever told you how much I admire you, Aunt Petunia?”

She looked down at him in shock, her squashed looking face scrunched up in suspicion. She said snidely,

“What do you mean, boy? Are you trying to be funny or something? Vernon'll have your hide if you are.”

Harry tried to look 'insulted at the very concept' and repentant. He shook his head liberally,

“No, Aunt Petunia, its simply that whenever I started going to school I realised how much better you were than everyone else. You're so much smarter and prettier. Other people can be so strange, don't you think? My teacher even says that we should be happy being different. I simply find it absurd, don't you?”

Aunt Petunia looked shocked for a moment, before a pleased smile lit up her face. It almost made her seem... pretty. Harry smiled inwardly. That was what she wanted from him. She started to babble on about how he might have “some brains after all” and gossiped nastily about all the other neighbours. Harry nodded in all the right places, putting small comments here and there, all the while working just as diligently as before.

That night for dinner he noticed she gave him just slightly more food than normal.

After a few months of working on Dudley, Aunt Petunia, and most of the teachers at the school, Harry had made some progress. Almost the whole neighbourhood had heard from their children that he was reformed, some still sent him snide glances, but other's smiled at him or said good morning. A drastic change from normal. Some still commented on his 'peculiar clothes' as he apparently still refused to wear good clothes, and insisted on rags, and some said he never should have cheated in the first place, but Harry thought that within a few years he could get more and more people to like him by acting how they wanted.

He feigned an interest in gardening with Aunt Petunia, saying one day in a shy sort of tone, that he was very grateful to work with such beautiful plants and thought that she was a very kind and considerate woman. His aunt beamed and gave him more time outside and less in his cupboard. The more he praised her, looked up to her, and generally pretended to value her, the more she seemed to tolerate him. She still thought he was a freak, and would every now and then break out in a tirade about his 'freakishness', and she still locked him in the cupboard, but now she gave him more food and water, three cups instead of two, and bigger meals. She often glanced at the cupboard reluctantly, as if she didn't want to lock him away, and she wanted to talk more, perhaps even give him some tea and sit down to gossip (she was really quite lonely), and she was all the more guilty looking and hesitant when she heard the sounds of Uncle Vernon beating him.

But she never stopped him.

Although she never stopped him, Harry liked to hope that if Uncle Vernon was going to kill him, then Aunt Petunia might intervene or call the police. But he squashed that thought down and locked it away, it was best not to hope.

Manipulating Dudley was turning out quite well. He was a bit dense, so Harry was less subtle than his previous approaches (even if they weren't particularly subtle) and he simply stated out right a few times

“Dudley, I respect you, and like you, and am sorry if I have offended you in the past.”

The first few times Dudley thought he was joking, but then over time he started to understand Harry was being serious. And then, surprisingly, one afternoon when Dudley was without his cronies, he said,

“Well... you are a freak, so I can understand why you would like me and respect me and all that. Plus you aren't trying to be better than me at school any more...”

He paused thoughtfully. As if contemplating Harry's words properly for the first time. Before saying gruffly,

“I still don't like you, and you're weird, but I accept your apology and... I wont beat you up as much.”

Harry had been a little startled, but very thankful (or so he seemed), smiling at Dudley and saying kind things. Dudley didn't like the praise as much as Aunt Petunia, since he got a lot of it, and it seemed to just make him shrug, but he wasn't punching Harry so it was a good sign of change. The conversation had been very blunt, but Dudley was a blunt sort of person, so it worked out okay.

From then on, instead of Dudley's gang beating him up every day, playing 'Harry Hunting', it was more two or three times a week when he had “acted smart in class” or other such offences. Dudley's gang didn't really know why they were leaving him alone, but they didn't seem to really care. Honestly, Harry wasn't sure why Dudley was the leader of their group in the first place. How had that happened?

He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

The last, and most dangerous, person for Harry to manipulate was Uncle Vernon. Not because he was particularly smarter or more perceptive than the others, more because he didn't have many qualms for hitting Harry for no reason. And Harry really didn't want to give him one.

The first thing Harry tried to realise was what it was that Uncle Vernon wanted from him. He had never really understood. And after a whole month of careful observation he had realised that it was quite like Dudley, except more fear than respect. His uncle wanted him afraid of him, but also to respect him, be it for power, or just because. So Harry started to act more fearful, thinking it might help him, but his uncle just called him “a wimp” or “you little cry baby.”

It did have the bonus of Aunt Petunia looking more guilty, especially when in between their 'gushing sessions' as Harry thought of them, he would make the odd comment about his uncle, and he would always make sure to look very fearful when hearing her speak about Uncle Vernon. One time he had even managed to make himself shake, and Aunt Petunia had asked “Are you okay?” before she remembered she was talking to him, and walked away, shouting at him to “do better work or something”. Harry had felt very proud in that moment, managing to wiggle into her subconscious so much that she slipped up. She cared about him, even if it was on a purely subconscious level.

So... His uncle did want fear, but it didn't seem to help Harry. He was slightly perplexed. But, he supposed it would simply make his uncle happy, not make him like Harry more. Harry wondered what else he might want, and came across something in a book which made him pause. A sadist. A sadist is someone who likes causing people pain. Did he...

Harry had shuddered.

Did he want Harry in pain? Perhaps... Perhaps if Harry acted more hurt then... he wouldn't hit him as much. His... desires would be sated. Gosh.

So... the next time Harry was beaten he made sure to scream, a rash move, high risk high reward, but one that might have a good ending. It... worked... sorta. His uncle was pleased, happier, Harry could see it in his eyes, but it didn't make him treat Harry nicer. It was worse. Much much worse. It was...

Bone chillingly horrifying.

His uncle had... brought out a knife, fists red with Harry's blood, and maybe his own from hitting him too hard, and... Harry's true self had leaked out slightly... just a smidge... and just his fear. He hadn't been able to keep it in. And when his uncle ripped that... knife from his nightmares... through his flesh his scream was very very real.

“I'll teach you not to scream, boy.”

High risk. High reward.

The sensation of that knife was burned into Harry's mind. It was like his whole side had been cut open, him split down the middle, chopped in half, and the blood... there had been so much... If Harry closed his eyes in the darkness of his cupboard “a week for screaming”, he could sometimes still feel the blood curdling burn of that knife.

He had a scar now.

And he realised something very important.

Harry would leave his uncle alone. Not manipulate him. Because... he didn't follow the same rules as anyone else. When the others were pleased with Harry they were nicer to him, cared for him even, looked at him in a better light. When his uncle was pleased with Harry he treated him worse. Or when his uncle was unhappy with him he treated him worse. Or angry. Or vengeful. Or bored. And Harry had a moment when he knew exactly why the rules didn't apply to his uncle, when he was lying there, bleeding, screaming in agony.

His uncle wasn't human.

His uncle was a monster.

And in that moment a tiny bit of humanity was chipped away from Harry's true self. Harry understood humans, but he now knew monsters existed. And that was the most terrifying thing he had ever known.

Knowing that made Harry just the slightest bit worse.

-o-

In Harry's eighth year of life some things had gotten better, and some things worse.

At school, Harry had managed to get steady 'B's, and his second grade teacher had been very proud. News had spread around the neighbourhood, and people started to look at him with less and less disdain. When Harry moved into third grade, the teacher did not instantly dismiss him as trouble. Instead he was treated like any other kid.

Harry's relationship with Aunt Petunia had improved drastically as well. Sometimes, and this was extremely rare, she would garden with him. Just small things like watering the plants or passing the spades, but the main difference was her mentality towards him. She was starting to like him. No where near the amount she liked Dudley, or Vernon, and sometimes she called him 'freak' to make up for doing something nice for him, but it did mean a bit to Harry. He was being fed more than ever, drinking almost four cups of water a day, and having a whole other meal. Not just breakfast and school lunch, but also dinner as well. Of course, it was a very sneaky exchange, and Harry had a feeling that Uncle Vernon didn't know she was doing it.

Harry hoped to god, or anyone that might be listening, that he didn't find out.

Dudley had become a 'friend'. Harry was no longer beat up at all, and sometimes when both Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were away Dudley would let him read some of his untouched books, or play cards with him. Dudley seemed to like Harry almost more than his minions, because Harry was a 'proper friend'. He didn't even ask Harry if he wanted to beat people up with him, and Harry's theory was that his cousin wanted to keep those aspects of his life separate.

Harry had even found a friend at school, since Dudley didn't beat everyone up who went near him any more. His friend wasn't very popular, because he only had one jacket to wear; he was poor. His name was Jeffrey Reginald, Harry called him Jeff, and they sometimes played handball at recess, or sat by the swings after school and talked. Jeff was taller than Harry, as were most, and had light brown hair that was cut quite short, blue eyes, and a nice looking face, but had a scar above his right eye from a car crash when he was little.

Like Harry did.

They had a bit of a kinship together because they both had tatty clothes, Harry 'confided' that his aunt and uncle never gave him anything better but no one believed him, and they both had lost a parent in a car crash. Jeff lived with his mother, because his father had died, and she was a drunk who sometimes got violent and threw plates at him. But he said it was “fine, because when she gets like that I know to lock myself in my room, and she always apologises after.”

After months of being together, Harry felt like Jeff was a real friend, and let himself act a little real for once, and shared his uncle's abuse. Jeff said “you oughta go to the coppers, that's illegal, that is. You can't hit a child.” Harry explained that it would do no good, and the last time he had told an adult they hadn't believed him. His relatives had called him a 'compulsive liar'.

They were a lot closer after that, and over the months of the abuse they both shared, they told stories of their lives and pasts. Jeff was appalled when Harry told him about the cupboard and chores, but Harry said it was just how it had always been and there wasn't any real way to change it. Frankly, he was just glad that someone had finally believed him, but he supposed it was hard to dismiss his claims when he had a long, thin, scar on his side from that evil knife.

Harry was appalled that his mother could blame Jeff for his father's death in a car crash. Harry said that no one tried to die in a car crash, it couldn't be Jeff's fault, and that she was utterly wrong. Saying that his relatives often said they “just died to get away from me”.

Jeff was also doing quite badly in school, 'D's, and Harry started to help him with his homework in the park. Soon they were as thick as thieves, blood brothers, and Harry's true self regained a little bit of his humanity.

While some things got better, some things got worse.

His uncle... was a lot worse. The beatings were harsher, sometimes Harry couldn't at all walk after them, and the knife... it wasn't just the once. He was right, he thought, his uncle must be a sadist. Who else could enjoy his suffering? Harry no longer had just one knife cut, he had one on his shoulder when his uncle was 'teasing' his neck, saying he could slit it any time he wanted and no one would care. Harry often had to remind himself that he had Jeff, Jeff would come to his funeral, Jeff would care, otherwise he swore he would go mad.

He had another cut turning scar, four cuts, along his side-cut. Small and sharp, as if his uncle was trying to reopen a scar. There was a cut on his hand, from when he pressed glass into it, 'experimenting'. And Harry was sure that because he hadn't screamed as much since that night, his uncle was almost trying to make him scream. But Harry didn't dare, not after what had happened that first time.

As the days passed on, and the seasons changed, Harry wondered more and more whether he should go to the police. Jeff was adamant, and he often threatened that he would every time Harry showed him a new scar or bruise. But Harry knew he couldn't. If he went to the police, and they didn't believe him and sent him back... Harry didn't think he would live. He was honestly sure that his uncle would kill him.

Harry didn't want to die.

-o-

Jeff was his best friend. But, Harry... didn't feel so... grounded as he used to. He felt a little like a ghost hanging just out of his body and watching things happen. Because he never did anything honestly any more, and his true self was more tightly locked away than ever. But, he still liked Jeff, almost loved him, because he was the only friend he was himself around.

Jeff tried to get him to join the local soccer team once, when they had had a game in the park and Harry turned out to be quite good at it, but he declined. He didn't have the time. Harry only really had the time to hang with Jeff because his aunt liked him so much more than she used to, and started doing more of the chores herself. She actually liked cooking, so it wasn't too much of a surprise.

Jeff took him to the cinema, for the first time ever, one night. He said “its a crime that you've never seen a movie. Ma mum sometimes gives me things to make up for her... incidents, and I get to go the the cinema almost twice a month.” Harry still told him he ought to go to the police, and Jeff told him the same.

They were at a stalemate, for neither of them wanted to go and not be believed.

And Jeff, still, somehow, loved his mother.

Harry, simply, loved being alive and would prefer not to be killed.

The movie was good. Quite gory. But Harry wasn't really phased because he had actually been tortured. They had a big box of popcorn and fizzy drinks, and when Harry returned home that night, and was locked away in darkness, he couldn't help but still feel a little happy.

His fourth grade teacher, a burly man with a goatee, was convinced that Harry had 'hidden potential', ever since Harry accidentally answered a very difficult question in class. The way Harry made sure he still got 'B's, but nothing above, was to put his hand up for every fourth question in class, and get seventy percent on his tests and homework. Or close to that.

But ever since he answered that question, when no one else could, his teacher had been looking more thoroughly into his work... and previous tests.

He was asked to stay after school one afternoon, to 'talk about his future', and Mr. Veneer told him,

“I know what you're doing, Harry, and I don't understand why. Every test and homework you get 70%, almost exactly, and in class you only put your hand up for every fourth question. You're smart, if what I think is correct and you're calculating your own scores, you could easily get an A.”

Harry shuffled his feet, trying to look embarrassed, caught and most of all 'innocent and young'. He said in a small voice,

“Whenever I got good scores before everyone always thought I was cheating, off of my cousin or whoever I was sitting with.”

Mr. Veneer looked concerned,

“Why would they think that?”

Harry shuffled again,

“My aunt and uncle don't like me much, and used to tell lies about how I was a cheat and a compulsive liar. I hope you can understand.”

His teacher paused in thought, looking even more worried.

“Harry... how long has this been going on?”

Harry gulped,

“Just since second grade.”

Mr. Veneer sighed,

“Well... Why don't you get 'A's now?”

Harry scrunched up his face, hoping to look 'cute or something' as Jeff sometimes said he looked.

“I could... but it would be better to get 'B's. Its a high score and everyone will believe I'm capable of it.”

His teacher didn't look happy with that response at all. Harry knew honesty was only painful, but he hoped for once that it wouldn't be. Stupid hope!

“Harry, you can't spend your life living for other people. Its important you try your best from now on. I can assure you that people will believe you.”

Of course Harry didn't, as he would simply end up with a beating or the neighbourhood scorn, and eventually his teacher gave up. He would still sometimes shoot Harry 'looks' in class when he only raised his hand every fourth question, and Harry noticed that the fourth question always tended to be the hardest question. Harry wondered if he would need a new strategy, and if he should sink his average down to 'C's again, just to make sure.

His relationship with Dudley was better than ever. He was Dudley's closest friend because, in Dudley's words, “the other guys are only friends because I'm cool... not because of who I am. But you like me, for me.” Harry thought it was sweet, and sometimes felt a little guilty for manipulating his cousin, but then he would remember the years of beatings and taunts and that guilt just soared out the window.

Aunt Petunia was becoming more and more of a mother to him, she was starting to see him as a child, her son, her boy, and not a freak. She was also looking more and more guilty every time Uncle Vernon beat him, and every time he was locked away. But, instead of helping him, she started to have a few more glasses of wine than she used to, and sometimes whispered an apology when she locked him under the stairs.

No first aid kit.

No police.

No help.

Harry still counted his aunt as an awful person, because she let her monster of a husband treat him as a pumpkin for Halloween. Dudley, Harry could understand, because Dudley had grown up like him. Thinking it was right. Dudley respected his father. Definitely. Perhaps even looked up to him, what a sickening thought. But he was also slightly afraid of him. So Harry couldn't really blame him for not helping. Even though Dudley saw Harry as a friend, he didn't have the bravery to help. But, Harry was only manipulating him anyway, he really hadn't expected anything different, and he ignored the small voice in his mind, locked in his true self, that felt slightly hurt that Dudley didn't care enough to help him.

Only Jeff wanted to help him. And when Harry saw him next, he almost cried. Was being nine years old always so god damn emotional? Harry made sure to lock his true self up extra tight, just in case.

There was no time for emotional breakdowns.

-o-

His aunt was out with his cousin. They were visiting Aunt Marge that night, and his uncle didn't want to go for some reason. Harry realised it was probably to torture him, something he was getting more and more enjoyment out of. His uncle was so... evil. Harry didn't know how much more he could stand, he couldn't lock everything away forever, and was increasingly wondering if he should go to the police like Jeff always urged him to.

If Harry went to the police he would talk about Jeff as well. He couldn't let his best friend stay there.

He saw a light flood his cupboard, and felt momentary relief, before he realised that this meant he would most likely be beaten. Harry turned to see his uncle at the door, squinting from the brightness, and seeing an unfamiliar gleam in his eyes. Then Harry was grabbed by the legs and thrown haphazardly into the living room.

He cowered, like he was meant to, and wondered what was going on; normally his uncle would have already started.

Harry looked up to see Uncle Vernon clearing the papers, TV remote, and plates off of the couch. Harry cocked his head to the side in confusion. What was he doing?

His uncle turned to him and Harry's blood froze.

That look... that demonic look on his uncle's face... What was going on? What?

He prowled, closer and closer, and Harry's heart started to beat madly in his chest. His uncle's walk was predatory and that stare was... was... hungry. And Harry started to get a crazy thought in his mind, but he quickly brushed it away. It wasn't possible. His uncle was just trying to scare him. Harry could never be one of those people that-

Harry was pulled roughly by his legs onto the couch, and he stared at his uncle in confusion. His uncle looming over him, leering at him. And Harry's eyes widened. And his breath caught. And he finally understood, and he was terrified. Harry tried to scramble away, tried to run to the door, but he couldn't, he was being held down.

And oh god, oh god, no! His uncle had flipped him so he was face first into the couch and RIP! Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. Harry's heart was beating painfully fast, and he was absolutely petrified. It couldn't be happening. This didn't happen. His pants were torn. No no no! Pulled down to his ankles. Oh god please no! And his uncle pulled his legs painfully apart, so they were spread, and Harry started to hyperventilate.

And he screamed, in absolute terror. A terror he had never felt before.

“No! NO! PLEASE NO! LET ME GO! NO GOD NO!”

And he tried to run.

“PLEASE NO PLEASE LET ME GO! GOD NO! NO!”

And he couldn't move.

“OH MY GOD NO! PLEASE! P- Please”

And he sobbed.

“Let me... No... let me go.”

Uncle Vernon, held his legs apart, and thrusted inside of him. And Harry screamed denials, and tried to get away, and pleaded for it to stop. This torture. Never this torture. And he was sobbing terribly because he felt like he was being split in two. Like his insides were ripped to shreds. And he could only sob brokenly to himself as he heard his uncle's moans and grunts. And he could only lie there while he was...

And it felt so wrong. It felt so so wrong. And it felt worse than anything his uncle had ever done before. Because... his uncle was in him. It was... And Harry was ruined. Absolutely ruined and broken. He was so helpless and sullied. He was... destroyed. Utterly and irreversibly destroyed. And something important split inside him, something important to everyone.

And his innocence was stolen, what little he had had left.

Harry cried into that pillow, and pleaded for it to end. For the horrors to end. And all he got... All he got for his troubles was the breathy command of

“Shut up, freak”

from his uncle. And another jab of pain, before he was filled with a burning hot liquid.

And he sobbed.

In the cupboard that night he curled in on himself. And cried into his mattress, and tried to hold himself together with his tiny arms. His eyes clenched shut. And he tried, oh god he tried, to pull all of that hurt away from his true self. From his 'I was lovable' feeling deep down. From his hopes and dreams and happiness.

But he couldn't.

And he was ruined. 'I was lovable' was 'I was lovable'. Hope was heartache. Happiness was replaced with pain. And... Harry was no longer a child.

Even if his mask was intact.

-o-

That night, when his uncle had gone to sleep, and Harry was still crying, he kicked his cupboard door. Hoping beyond hope that it would break. Eventually he felt the old lock on the outside snap, and he took his school bag, and ran out of the house as fast as he could, as if he was being chased. Hunted. Harry ran and he ran and he ran, and he didn't stop running until he no longer felt he was being chased. Which was a long time.

And soon enough he reached the other end of town, where Jeff's house was. An old rickety house, with the roof caved in on one side, and too little money to pay to fix it, because most of the money was used for boos, apology gifts and groceries. Harry slammed up to the door, and banged on it like crazy, glancing behind him in paranoia, as if his uncle was there.

After five minutes of non stop banging, at three in the morning, a tatty looking woman with red balding hair and a dirty pink nightgown came to the door. Her breath smelt of alcohol, but Harry knew she was sober because it smelt a day or so old. She was sober.

Thank god.

Jeff's mother glared at him and grunted,

“Who are you? And what do you want?”

Harry, with tears still pouring down his cheeks, and hands tucked tightly around the bag he was holding against his chest, said breathlessly,

“I need to see Jeff. Right now. I need to see him. Please.”

She rolled her eyes and shouted,

“Jeff! There's a boy here at the door for you... for some reason.”

Then she turned and stalked back across the house, and back to bed.

Jeff came running down the stairs, in his ratty pyjamas, and not at all surprised at seeing Harry there in the dead of night. Sometimes Harry came to see him when his uncle got too bad, so Jeff knew he just wanted to stay until school the next day. What Jeff didn't expect to see was his best friend, in tears, wearing more-raggedy-than-usual rags, and a haunted expression. He of course didn't see this until he was all the way down the stairs.

“Hey Harry, my mum got me the new Nintendo Gameboy and- Wow... are you okay? What happened? Harry?”

Harry just stood there, sobbing into his hands. Jeff reached over to hug him, or comfort him, but Harry flinched violently away and screeched,

“Don't touch me!”

Jeff backed away, closing the front door, and stared in shock at his friend. What had happened? Harry never reacted like that, he was usual happy for a hug... he didn't get any at home. Jeff led him to their ripped plaid sofa, without touching him, and handed the now shaking Harry a glass of water. Harry took it, drank it all, placed it down, and then started to rock himself on the couch, holding his knees up to his chest and holding his bag like a life line.

Jeff said softly,

“What happened Harry?”

He leaned in a little closer to his best friend, only to hear him saying to himself over and over again 'oh god oh god oh god oh god'.

Now Jeff was getting worried.

“Harry?”

He turned to Jeff, seeing concern in his friends eyes,

“I can't go back there.”

Jeff nodded in agreement,

“What changed?”

Harry started to cry again, chanting some more 'oh god's, rocking himself more.

“He... He... Oh my god.”

“Harry?”

Harry turned to him, looking through terrified eyes, more terrified than Jeff had ever seen.

“Are you hurt, Harry?”

Harry couldn't stomach looking at him, and settled for his knuckles, stark white from holding his bag so tightly. He whispered,

“Oh my god, Jeff.”

Jeff urged him to tell him, and Harry said,

“R- R... He ra- raped me.”

Jeff blanched. Harry broke down into more sobs.

Oh my god, indeed.

-o-

The first place they went was the hospital. Jeff had a cousin, who had a friend who had been raped in college, and she had told him the first place you should go was the hospital. She also said you should never blame the victim, because it was never their fault.

Jeff had never thought he would have needed to know, his cousin had always thought his grandfather was a bit creepy, and told him just in case. Jeff wasn't sure if he was happy his grandfather was dead, because he wasn't sure if it was true or not.

They reached the emergency room. And Harry couldn't stop shaking. He almost retched once. Everything had been pulled down around him, and he couldn't be as strong as he normally was. Couldn't stop thinking they wouldn't believe him. But Jeff was there, holding his hand, and telling him that everything would be okay. Harry asked why he was still there, why he still cared, and Jeff said they were best friends, and nothing could ever change that.

They were both very shaken by what had happened.

The ER doctors were shocked by someone so young being a victim of sexual assault, and they moved Harry up so he was seen first. As it was an emergency. The nurse who had originally found him was a young brunet, her hair in a bun, and she had started off looking at them both as if they had done something 'young and silly' to end up in hospital.

Jeff shakily told her what had happened, because Harry didn't think he could say it again, and she said she was so sorry and she would fetch a doctor straight away. The doctors examined him, and his backside, which made Harry feel very uncomfortable. They took 'samples', whatever that meant, and called the police. They also assigned Harry a therapist, and once Jeff admitted it was Harry's uncle who had done it, they called Social Services as well.

Soon the police arrived at the hospital, and a very gentle looking man with blonde hair and brown eyes took a report. And Harry wondered why he hadn't gone to the police sooner.

Jeff wanted to stay with him that night in the hospital, but his mother ordered him to go home and he didn't want her mad. Before he left Harry tried to tell the police about Jeff as well, but his best friend forced him to shut up and said that his mother “isn't that bad, she just has a bit of a temper and drinks a bit too much.” But quiet enough so only Harry could hear, while he smiled charmingly to the doctors.

The police didn't stay for long, mostly talking to the doctors, so Harry couldn't tell them before he fell asleep that night.

-o-

The next morning when Harry awoke, he opened his eyes to darkness. And panicked. He started to breathe erratically, but thought it was impossible; since he was at the hospital. But, then he banged his head on the ceiling and he wasn't so sure.

An hour later his cupboard door opened and Harry could scarcely breathe.

It was like a waking nightmare.

He was back in the cupboard.

He got up to see his relatives at the table, looking expectant. There was a large amount of pity in his aunt's eyes as she saw his bloody backside. And his cousin looked very worried, because something else must have happened to his closest friend. His uncle just looked... very pleased with himself. And Harry had a hard time staying conscious.

But he took his true self, and all his real feelings, and buried them deep inside him locked away. So he wouldn't be tainted further by his family's evil.

And he made breakfast, like nothing was different.

-o-

That day at school, after Aunt Petunia had discretely handed him some clean clothes and a whispered apology, he told Jeff what had happened. And Jeff had remembered the day before and was utterly shocked, appalled and sort of frightened.

“They wouldn't send you back to 'em, Harry. They just wouldn't. There's something else going on here. Something that made all the doctors and police not do their job, just so you would stay where you were. Your family couldn't have talked their way out of what they did because there was evidence and we went to the hospital. I...”

He brushed a hand through his hair in stress.

“I don't know what to do. They believed you, but... but... I don't know. Money? Were they bribed? Or... was it something else? Threats? But who would want to keep you with those monsters? Why? Your uncle doesn't have that much money, even if he does live in a fancy house, and I can't think of anyone else who would want to torture you. But, you can stay with me from now on, and we'll need to investigate this.”

Harry shook his head, looking around worriedly,

“No. If this person, or collective, or something managed to threaten or bribe the hospital, the police station, and all the witnesses, along with placing me back in the house with no one knowing any better, they must be powerful people. Its safer if you just stay out of this.”

Jeff looked in tears, and shouted at him,

“He raped you! He's evil! You can't stay there... and have to be... And oh god! Stay with me! Stay away from them! I would rather run away with you, than let you be... be...”

Harry ducked his head, holding his head in his hands, trying not to flinch when Jeff patted him on the back. He murmured,

“What are we going to do? I can't stay with you. Your mum will never allow it, and I don't want to get you in trouble. Run away? What if they find us? What if they hurt you? Or... Or... convince you to forget about it all.”

Jeff looked at him solemnly,

“I would never let them threaten me like that. Never look the other way.”

Harry cried out,

“You can't mean that! What if they... threaten your mother? Am I really more important than your own flesh and blood. What if they hurt you?”

Jeff gulped, looking pensive, as Harry pushed down all his rocky emotions that kept flying off the handle. After a few minutes Jeff said,

“My mum... Well... She's not the best mum, but I do still love her. And she is still my mum. But she's a grown woman, and she's strong, I should know from all the scars she's given me. And not just throwing things either. And Harry, you're my best friend, you'll always be my best friend, and... and... You're like a brother to me Harry. And I can't let that happen to you, even if it means I'm in danger or my mum. Because... you're closer than family to me.”

Harry sniffed, and said in a very small grateful voice,

“Jeff, you're my brother too. You'll never know what that means to me.”

And they hugged, both a little teary eyed, and Harry barely flinched.

-o-

Those following weeks were probably the best weeks of Harry's entire life. After stealing all the money from his mother's purse, him and Jeff took a train down to London, hoping to find somewhere cheap to stay. They used fake names, and wore sunglasses and big hats, so they wouldn't be followed.

They knew the money wouldn't last forever, so Harry used his skills as a manipulator to convince family's to give him the rest of their lunches, by looking 'cute and innocent.' Jeff sometimes teased him about it, but he never complained about the food they were getting so Harry simply gave him a 'So what?' kind of look. The place they stayed at didn't really care that they were only nine years old, just glad they had money, and for a while there Harry had hope that he would never have to return to the Dursleys.

Him and Jeff bought a pack of cards, and a book on magic tricks. They played together, all sorts of games, from 'Go fish' to 'Rummy' to 'Beggy your neighbour', because they had a lot of time on their hands. They became local street magicians, getting better at card tricks over the weeks and eventually went busking for a small income.

They shared their dreams for the future, wondering how soon they would need to buy school books or something, because they didn't want to “end up uneducated fools”. Jeff wanted to be a lawyer, to help people like them. And Harry wanted to be a doctor, because anatomy interested him, and he wanted to help as well. To bring something back to the world. And life between them was good, and they were both so happy it was almost criminal.

And it was not to last.

One day, while they had quite a large crowd of five people, Harry saw a head of grey hair and then the world went dark.

When he awoke again it was to his worst nightmare.

In the cupboard.

With his uncle leaning over him.

“Thought you could run away from me, did ya freak?”

And when he was let out a week later he found out the worst news.

Jeff was dead.

-o-

Harry's tenth birthday was three days after Jeff's funeral.

He had written a eulogy, since his mother hadn't been able to attend, she hadn't been sober since Jeff's death. Not many people showed up. Only a handful, and only two people were crying. Him and Jeff's cousin. There were a few others, Jeff's relatives, and a few kids from school that knew him as acquaintances. As well as Harry fourth grade teacher.

“Jeff was my brother, in all but blood, and he was the best person I had ever met. But like he would have said 'that isn't a very hard thing to do since most of the people you know are real ass-hats'. We shared a lot in common, Jeff and I, both had a parent die in a car crash, both had scars above our right eyes, both had ratty clothes and ratty guardians.”

Some people glared at him at the last bit, and Harry smiled weakly,

“Of course, the Dursleys are perfectly fine guardians. Jeff would have laughed at that as well. He died doing an honourable thing, I'm sure, or a very rash thing. Like trying to save me. But I suppose we don't need to go into the details, as all of us here know Jeff was a good guy. He didn't do very well at school, but last year he was hoping to start getting 'C's. He always tried his best, and always tried to help others, but unlike anyone else, when things got dangerous he didn't stop trying to help. Which makes him a lot more courageous than a lot of adults I've met.”

A few people looked a bit guilty at that part, and Harry realised they probably knew about Jeff's mother, just like him.

“Jeff was a very kind soul, and very funny too. Very self sacrificing. I remember back when people still blamed me for a lot of things, he once took the fall. Before we were even friends. Before I became reformed. I hadn't known him then, and had of course thought it was very odd that he had done such a thing, but now I know that it was just the way he was. A nice guy. Jeff was the very best friend I have ever had, but I don't have any other friends so I suppose there isn't much to base it off. I hope, with all of my heart, that there is a heaven up there, so Jeff can go there and finally be happy. It would be awfully cruel if there wasn't. Life is cruel and unfair, I just hope death is a little more understanding. Good luck Jeff, I'll see you on the other side, I hope you don't mind waiting a while.”

Most of the crowd was looking at Harry speculatively, a few disappointed. But Harry had never been good at writing speeches, especially heart felt ones, and he had tried his best.

He hoped Jeff liked it.

-o-

After Jeff's death things got worse in general, and Harry's tenth year of life, sixth grade, was very trying.

Harry had squashed down all his sadness, anger, and emotions more than he had ever done before, and sometimes felt he was just a shell walking around. Once Jeff had died a lot of his humanity seemed to disappear, as there was no one left alive that he cared about. He often wondered how bad it would be to kill the Dursleys, since they were so awful to him.

Would he be able to break that moral? Risk prison?

He wasn't even sure life was worth it any more, since every day was so torturous. He would have to say, objectively, that his least favourite torture was the rape. It seemed so much more... violating than the beatings and cuttings. And his uncle seemed so much more pleased with that method than all the past ones. Harry sometimes wondered if his whole goal had been to break Harry.

Had he succeeded?

After the brief reprieve Harry had had, whilst being friends with Jeff, he started back with his masks and manipulations. Testing out different things, to be what people wanted. School was okay now, and some often walked over to him to invite him to play or say hello. Harry just dismissed them, knowing that Jeff had been his only real friend, and the pain of losing him was too fresh to handle a new friend.

His fourth grade teacher, who still taught the fourth graders, not the sixth graders like him, often looked at him worriedly as he sat alone in the playground simply staring across at the park that he used to visit. One time he had come over to ask if he was okay, and noticed that he had begun getting 'C's again. Harry had simply put on a mask, a convincing one, and said that he was fine, just a little sad.

The teacher had walked away satisfied, and Harry had bundled his emotions up deeper inside. There was no need to show it on the surface, that helped no one.

Dudley was worried about him, and even invited him to help beat people up. But Harry put on a fake smile and told him he'd rather not, simply because Dudley was better at it. He seemed to understand, and simply invited him to play more video games with him when Harry wasn't doing chores.

Aunt Petunia had heard about Jeff's death, and suddenly understood why Harry was being so 'moody'. Sure, it had nothing to do with the weekly rapes, and daily beatings. She had shared a story of how much it hurt to lose her sister, Harry's mother, to the prostitution business. She had said it was almost as if her sister was dead, by being such a freak. Harry had given her a 'sorry for your loss' look and had thanked her for sharing such a 'considerate story'.

She was quite fond of him now, and she now handed him first aid kits when Uncle Vernon hurt him too badly. His aunt would sit and watch him garden, sipping her tea, and talk to him about all the plants and all her old friends which had moved away. She sometimes praised him for doing things, said “you planted that quite nicely” or “that dinner was nice”. Of course, his uncle just assume his aunt was hoping to be praised for her cooking.

He didn't understand that Harry did most of the cooking.

One afternoon she even gave him a book. On gardening. And Harry realised it was a birthday present. Shame she hadn't thought enough to give him a torch as well, so he could read it too. But he thought it was a nice thought anyway, and was wondering if he had Stockholm Syndrome because he was 'fond' of his aunt. Just a smidge. Maybe he saw her as a fellow prisoner?

It would be awful to have to sleep with Uncle Vernon willingly.

You couldn't say it was rape if you said 'yes' and didn't back down.

Harry wondered absently if his life would always be like this. If he would simply be trapped in his home, always to be treated like a slave, punching bag, whore and locked away when no longer needed. And he started to ask a question he had asked long long ago... What had he done to deserve this?

It didn't make sense.

But Harry continued with his plan, and tried to ignore the increasingly violent thoughts from his true self that wanted them all to pay for their crimes. For everyone to pay. Harry did want that. But he needed to be patient. He needed an opportunity. He needed to understand why some undefinable power was trying to keep him locked away here.

And when he finally had the opportunity, when he had finally worked everything out... they would all pay.

### Chapter Two.

“Ask me why. I dare you.”

She didn't say anything, as Harry had predicted.

He gave her his charming smile, the one he had stolen from the golden haired model from the magazine, and she seemed to relax. They always relaxed with that smile.

Harry Potter was an extremely odd child. Unlike most his age he seemed to possess a depth unheard of. There appeared to be many shallow waters, many facades, but beneath it all was a truly sincere mind, deep waters remained untouched... or as _he_ liked to believe, some of his soul had been spared hardship. Slithers pulsed in purity, still. Those who knew him would comment numerous distinctly different things. Dudley Dursley would, of course, describe his cousin as short, and lacking the “boy” faculties that were needed for the fine art of bullying, subtly implying that Harry was his best friend but too embarrassed to say so outright; he would mutter so in fewer words, more grunts. Aunt Petunia would decline to speak about her nephew, instead shiftily shuffling from foot to foot with eyes downcast; she was the type who preferred her nephew to be neither seen nor heard but of ultimate _use_ , like an arm chair or a gardening book. She would peruse him from time to time, would smile and exude pleasure from compliments he gifted, but would ultimately prefer the child to remain hidden away. Luckily enough they owned a cupboard perfect for such a circumstance, how splendid! How perfectly marvellous. Uncle Vernon would, also, decline to share his thoughts on “the boy”, but the inquirer would most likely be so very unsettled by the hungry look in the rotund man's ghoulish eyes that they would cease investigation soon enough and flee to the nearest safe haven – possibly the arms of another, or the warm embrace of a tavern's drink.

Mr. Veneer, additionally known as Harry Potter's fourth grade teacher, would give a wistful smile and mention some faint murmurings about how he was capable of great things but lacked self esteem. The neighbourhood ladies, aligned with Aunt Petunia's various interests, would be remiss if they did not invite the inquirer over for tea and biscuits, and would then proceed to gossip over how the “Potter boy” was always so scruffy, although he had become less of a delinquent over the years – “must be that Petunia of his, she'd have taught him some manners.” Unnamed and Mary Sue like pupils of St. Grogory's would pay most attention to Harry's lack of socialisation, and describe him as an insular boy who did not interact often with others. They saw him as a dark spectre, felt a strange creeping sensation when Harry grew too close, as if a lanky shadow were suspended above them like rope from bridge; dangling, ever fragile, over ravenous river rapids. Of course, for those who had _met_ him, would perceive him as perfectly lovely, charming and sunny, like a summer smile shed enchantingly. The more observant of the mix would perhaps perceive him as a variable; he was who he was _dependant_ on who he was with. The “x” was Harry, and the “y” was purpose, he shifted constantly on a flat plane, although _only_ those who excelled in academics and deductions would utilise such a metaphor.

The butcher on Kent St. who Harry always bought bacon from in large juicy rashers would describe Harry Potter as a bright and disarming lad, with a cheerful smile that could light up the room. Martha Reginald would whisper something about a friend to her son, before quickly vacating the room for the engulfing solace of alcohol. The wizarding world, so far undiscovered by young Harry Potter, would describe him as something of a hero, a perfect saviour, the epitome of a “good Light wizard”. Draco Malfoy would describe Harry Potter as a powerful ally, one he was looking forward to meeting come the Hogwarts Express, but would only lay admission to such in the comfort of his own mind, as honest discourse was strictly prohibited for any growing prepubescent purebloods with a lick of preservation and sense. The occasional passer by on the street would detail Harry Potter to be... just a normal boy. Just a child.

Of course, the truth of the matter, was far darker than the divisive nature of his outward appearance. But, through suppression and selective memory, the truth went unacknowledged and repressed. Honesty slipped through the cracks into shadow and spectre. Verity was little more than a mythological beast; oozing intangibility like a dragon, it simply didn't _exist_. Life, for the poor boy, was a prism of two dimensions; Harry being a two dimensional individual for each person, a puppet with shifting expressions, and _that was life._ There were no underlying meanings or secrets. Instead, there were only times when Harry was present, and times that he chose to politely remove himself from reality. ( _excuse me ma'am, may I fade from existence for a moment?_ He would ask as if he were perfunctorily inquiring to leaving the dinner table.)

He did so very discreetly, this hidden withdrawal, that no one even noticed, no one batted an eye at the tale of the disappearing boy. And that was it. That was the end of the story, there was nothing further to think about, everything existed on the surface. Life was only presence, and, conversely, the milky floaty feeling that came about when he stopped trying so hard to exist. Those two things were the only things that remained real – life was two parallel roads, _being_ and _non being_ , and Harry experienced both. He walked both paths, switched from one to the other and back again as easily as he breathed. He morphed into existence and limbo as easily as he locked himself away in a cupboard that smelt of dampness.

One of those times, the mute moments where reality ceased, was the scheduled Sunday evening; which never occurred in the first place. Sunday evening was a phantom, and only existed in the slimmest of glimmers, barely even there, less corporeal than a ghost. Harry never considered Sunday evening; only a fool would. Sunday evening may as well only be remembered in the abstract, devoid of touch, the breath of truth, only contemplated by philosophers and scholars alike. In other the words only the mad would comprehend Sunday evening. It reviled many as a concept entrenched in shadow, neither touched nor prodded, neither seen nor acknowledged. It was safer to simply skip from Sunday morning to Monday. Some may call that cheating but Harry never intended to play the game of life fairly.

Gaps of time were a part of every day life after all, consider sleep. Every time Harry slept he lost time. Sleep was a waste, truly, who had that much time to spare? Only the rich and the lucky could afford uninterrupted sleep, but even then it was often ungraspable by human hands. The point _was_ that gaps of time were normal, and thus Sunday evening's lack of substance was also normal.

Everything was normal. Don't worry. This was just how it was. Deep breaths. Don't think too much. It was okay to float sometimes. This was just life.

He rocketed back down to earth. She was still looking at him _still_ , her shoulders slightly coiled, as if suspicious, as if pressed down like a spring prepared to violently erupt up. He smiled again. Turned up the brightness. Like adjusting the dial on a radio, concentrating the charm. She turned away, placated, her plaited ponytail flicking back against her back. Harry watched her go, intent and focused on her fading figure. She seemed to shrink as the distance widened between them, the berth of the playground opened up like an abyss.

“Bitches aye?”

Dudley smirked into Harry's ear with a hot breath that reminded Harry of nights layed back against the _couch, hair splayed, eyes clenched shut, “open your eyes boy”, forgotten Sundays, the smell of burned alcohol, singed hair, he always said “bitch”, Harry couldn't breathe-_

The box settled in his chest, silent and heavy. Emotions spirited away within the confines. His breath settled like water on smooth miles of glass, soothingly drifting from either side of the planes, oscillating, before it all fell dormant. _I was just caught of guard by the new swear_ Harry patronised himself, his mind easily spotted the lie but let it go. He'd gotten good at letting things go. _I'll do better next time_.

Dudley gifted him that friendly smile, it was regular and there was some solace to be found in the customary.

His heart didn't twinge one bit in the thought of Jeff in that smile, it never did anymore. It had been as if all his feelings for Jeff had disappeared just as the box had come along. He didn't miss them. The pain, the anguish. He never missed them. And he never missed Jeff either. _I really really don't_ he pleaded, as if trying to convince himself.

He and Dudley were best friends now. Or, Dudley thought they were best friends, and Harry resisted all those choked up rotten words that desperately wanted to spill out and ruin everything. The ones that wished to holler resentfully, brutally, “why are you not my best friend on Sunday evenings?” but never did. The words that wished to slice his cousin open, unhinge him from the seams. It was easier this way, to just nod along as Dudley flaunted his newly gained knowledge of the b-word. He revelled in showing off the latest trinkets he'd gleaned shoplifting with the highschoolers; his latest blasphemy. He palmed such expletives off onto his friends, like obscure sports trading cards, deliciously valuable. It was a forbidden art, to swear, to unearth the dredges of the vulgar. Mothers' reprimands stilled outside the sight line of the teachers. It was as if they were invincible with those words, godly figures reigning out above the playground, year six, the top of the food chain. The other boys lapped it all up, mouths open and gaping, desire imminent.

Harry laughed raucously with the others, his mouth cracking up into a bleak grin. It stayed indiscernible from his regular grin. It was the same grin he practiced in front of the little pocket mirror that Dudley had shoplifted for him from the mall. The ornate engraved nature of it felt expensive. A younger Harry might have given back the stolen good. Now, Harry sat in the mildew dark of his cupboard, the shouts from Uncle Vernon staining the back of his collar, the hand mirror down at the cracks so sheets of light reflected onto it from the hallway. With this light he could practice his smarmy smirks. He could fit in, camouflage, like a killer in broad daylight playing the blood off as an art project.

_Oh this, just something for my sweetheart back home, some sticky hot red blood on my hands for her._

There had been that other voice in his head lately. The one less focussed on survival and more on vengeance. It didn't have a name. Harry didn't know if he was scared of it or not, unsure if it was a curse or a blessing, so for now he pretended it didn't exist. This voice rumbled like thunder in his chest, hotly whispering that people would pay, that Harry would be free. Harry felt as if the voice had escaped from his finely tuned box, slipped through the cracks somehow. It smelt of burnt smoke and danger, just like everything in that box.

Volatile.

“Hey, Harry, anyone home?”

Dudley smiled again, waving a hand in front of his cousin's face. Harry blinked, wide and disconcerted, as if he had drifted up into the sky. Dudley's expression showed faint echoes of concern, perhaps he had spied such fleeting images on his own mother's face from time to time as Harry – doll-like – strung up the wet loads of washing as the dryer hummed, full. Piers Polkiss grinned, chuffed up and smarmy. His eyes were black beads, shining in the sun that reflected off the cement of the playground,

“ _Yeah_ Potter, anyone behind those glasses of yours?”

Harry smiled back completely devoid of humour, as if one had carved his face out of soot,

“Why, Piers, do you see your own expression reflected in the glass?”

Piers huffed, his arm rolling in its socket as he revved up a punch. Dudley intervened; he disliked the tension that had stirred ever since Harry's change in status. Without someone to habitually chase around to blow off steam and beat into a bloody pulp, his gang had grown restless. It was his sworn duty as gang leader to search for a new target. He pacified the group with an easy going smile, it was one he'd gained from the elder crooks who were less concerned with petty fights and more involved in drugs and shoplifting, (they had their priorities sorted)

“Let's all just chill. Break's almost up, anyway.”

“Since when'd _you_ _want_ to get to class, Duds?”

Joked Mark Maccam, a stout child who would likely be the last structure to fall in the inevitable occasion of an earthquake. He put Dudley's many notorious rolls of fat to shame with his daily rendition of being a solid brick of blubber. Dudley laughed loud. Harry watched, half-dazed, and the group began to drift over to the classroom.

“S'what's everyone's plans for break?”

Dudley asked.

“ _My_ family is going to Sudden. The circus is coming into town, and mum's excited. They have _heaps_ of freaky stuff there, it'll be wicked as.”

Piers boasted, and Harry took down a studious mental note that perhaps he was compensating for something. A tremor may or may not have travelled under Harry's skin at the word “freak”, but of course, the box settled it easily enough.

It was common knowledge in Surrey that Piers' aunt was a world-class acrobat, and routinely featured in renowned circus shows as a resplendent star-act. She was the star of the family and had funded many a family beach vacation. Piers' mother, sometimes, when prevailing the Neighbourhood Ladies with swirling tales of her sister's accomplishments, would gain a glint similar to Aunt Petunia. It was eerie, as if Harry were travelling into the past, cryptic.

Sam or Tom, Harry wasn't sure of the particulars of his name, was wallpaper. He faded into the backdrop so easily that people forgot he was there; an invisible child. Sam or Tom commented with a wistful smile,

“We'll just be in Surrey. My pa has been on at me to study up, he's been rowdy about all my grades. It's not my fault my sister is a _bitch_ who keeps us all up with her crap!”

He seemed to be testing out the newly learned b-word with relish. Dudley's ears perked,

“What shit d'you mean?”

Sam or Tom admitted,

“She... uh, _goes through_ a lot of boys, they... stay in her room and she's _noisy_!”

Piers wolf whistled in such a way that Harry felt all his skin slip into jelly. His body lost solidity, and he was suddenly a human bowl of flan. He could predict this conversation, and a chord struck deep in the chambers of his head.

“Is she hot?”

Sam or Tom looked deeply disgusted,

“She's my _sister_!”

Piers smirked,

“But, is she _hot_?”

The boy shrugged uneasily,

“I dunno. I don't, you know, think of her _like that_.”

Dudley elbowed his way into the conversation, mouth one huge smirk that reached all the way to Saturn,

“Wait, wait, what's your last name Sam?”

The boy confirmed as Sam shrugged,

“Green, why?”

Dudley's smirk enlarged, from ear to ear like some grotesque rendition of the Joker. Harry had seen the pale-faced villain on comic strips that Dudley offered him. It was almost their daily tradition; he would prepare breakfast, and then under toast and table alike Dudley would shove a long rectangle of Batman into his grip. Harry thought it was meant to be a kindness of a sort, but was not yet sure.

“ _Well_ would your sister happen to be _Delphine_ Green?”

Piers' eyes lit up as Sam nodded hesitantly. He whispered religiously,

“ _The_ Delphine Green?”

“Yes.”

“ _Really_? But she's... she's...”

Knowledge hit Harry like a freight train. Square in the forehead like a bolt of lightning. He knew exactly who they were discussing. As the newly painted door of the classroom neared, he caught an image of Delphine Green in his mind. She was an art piece, mile long legs, hair flooded down her back magnificently, clothes stuck to skin like a second waxy layer. It wasn't even sexual, this appreciation, it was as if they stared, gormless and humbled, at a goddess, a beauty, a rare exotic specimen. Sam's sister was the antithesis to him; where he stood in shadow she stepped out into harsh sun. Sam, soft-spoken, shy, hardly seen, would sit quietly and not understand school, whereas Delphine would shoot up and cuss at teachers, lip stick smeared across her goldenised face like a clown's mimicry, her body a shared emblem she wore with pride and showed off.

Piers seemed at a loss for words, as if fading off into a comprehension of god. Dudley just stood there, smiling knowingly at all of them, as if he were the keeper to some grand secret. Sam swayed, puzzled, daunted. The other boys seemed just as out of the loop as they always seemed; young and naïve, like pups. But, just like pups, they could be trained for the violence of wolves. Like all children could. Like Delphine already was; a predator.

Harry finished the sentence, soft and barely daring to breathe,

“She's a slut.”

It was said with a sense of finality. Harry felt as if he had sealed his own fate with those words, somehow. Yet, saying it, freeing this toxic phrase from the confines of his mouth, was also a release, it was delicious. He felt electrified, his whole body lit up with this foreign _power_. This forbidden _word_ , this secret club he had entered upon the expel of such syllables, this tribal inclusion that had opened before him like the golden gates of heaven itself!

At the same time, his body revolted against it. Limb and land alike bucked under him, an unruly beast. It remembered another whispered “slut” in its ear, it remembered hands held, it remember the couch, the taste of pillow in mouth, tongue tucked back because he didn't want to bite it in case he screame-

“What? No! That's my _sister_ , shut up Harry. What do _you_ know anyway, you've never even _looked_ at a girl. Probably.. fricking... _fucking_ queer!”

Sam lashed out, angry and defending his loose elder sibling. Harry stared him dead on, his eyes a blank slip of grey against what appeared to be a squeaky child spitting out at the world. _Pitiful, really,_ said the broiling darkness in Harry's head. It was the voice that wanted to spit poison at the world, to blind and hurt people, the one that thought that it was _hurt_ or _be hurt_. There was something dark and heavy in him that wanted to skin Sam alive, like the weak pathetic child he was. There was this pool of indefatigable rage welling in his gut, that screamed and screamed, tired of being hurt, tired of being put in a corner and injured, of being forgotten and ignored.

Dudley, normally one to step in, watched inactively. He was passive in that glimpse of time. To walk in now could lead to an usurping of his own status, to defend his _male_ cousin from an accusation of _queer_ was as good as an admittance. He watched with wary eyes, he didn't want his best friend to be the object of scorn, but he could not intervene without placing his own person in peril. He liked Harry, after all, but everyone had a line they couldn't cross.  
  
Harry stepped forward as Sam continued to yell, unbridled and rageful,

“Yeah, you... fri- _fucking faggot_ , huh? Is that why you're lying about my sister, huh, because you don't want everyone to know? What is it Miss Stewart says about everyone, Harry, that we need to be _nice_ to each other? Mm, are you so _gay_ that you're lashing out, huh, should we feel bad?”

Harry walked, again, so close to Sam that the air they breathed was hot and humid. Their noses touched. Sam stumbled back, laughing off his fear, feral and hysterical,

“Trying to _kiss_ me!”

Harry whispered, clear and spiteful, this hurt deformed thing in his gut drowning in pain,

“I said that she is a slut, because she _is_. We _all know_ about your sister. Its the talk of the school. I bet there's been _hundreds_ of boys. I bet she's a spoiled _loose_ thing by now, unlovable. I bet you know _all about it_ Sammy, yeah? I bet she kisses _you_ nice and well, I bet you're _so upset_ about your sister because she's kissing _you_! Got to defend your incestuous little _girlfriend_ after all, you frea- ugly weirdo. Does she, does she...”  
  


There was a road block here. He couldn't quite say it, for some reason. If he didn't, Sam would win, everyone would know Harry was a chicken, would assume he was gay and that Sam was right. It didn't matter if Delphine was really a slut or not, none of this mattered, it mattered if _Harry_ could say these words. And his heart ached, because there was the survival and there was the hateful, and he didn't know where one began and the other ended, and he didn't know if he could betray himself, because _Harry_ of all people knew that _sex_ didn't make you a slut. It _couldn't_. Otherwise, what was Harry?

_Close your eyes and don't think about it, because it will be over soon, and you'll get out of here, just close your eyes and drift away_ Harry repeated the words like a mantra. They thrummed, lively, under his skin like many clamouring teems of insects all scrabbling to shed blood.

The rage propelled him, fast and furious, without forgiveness. Cut-throat. Harry had no time for friends, and how bad were words anyway?

“She _does_ , doesn't she? She kisses you, nice and hard, makes out with her _tongue_ in your mouth. You _love it_ , don't you? Your dirty _whore_ of a sister, kissing you, I know you do.”

Sam fell back, completely shocked, his eyes open and frightened. Piers wolf whistled again, his eyes belied his new appreciation for Harry. Sam blubbered, trying to defend himself,

“W-what? _No_! I would ne- what? No, that's not-”

Harry grinned, shark-like. It felt good to let this out. Maybe playing it safe didn't mean he had to keep it all in. Maybe there were other ways.

He let his box creak open just a slither. Normally, Sunday Evenings were forbidden, a sacred untouched place, but maybe just a peak? Harry dipped inside and fleshed out some of his Uncle's _words_.

“Or, is it more, pretty little slutty Sammy? Did she _touch_ you? Oh, I bet she did, I bet you just layed there and loved every second. Arching up like the quivering _slut_ you are. Is she who you learnt it from? You're a bitch too, aren't you? What converted you, eh? Was it her soft pink flushed hand on your coc-”

“ _NO!_ ”

Harry looked back down at the mess of flesh on the oval. His eyes were red ringed, puffy. Harry realised Sam was crying. He didn't let his expression waver. He was a stiff statue in a sea of serenity, untouched, unflappable. No wind dared shift this tableau – of the tiny slip of shadow strewn theatrically across the floor, of the stunted slab of agony arched up in the form of Harry's figure. Sam couldn't seem to catch his breath, it was as if the air held no oxygen, no reprieve.

Dudley stared down, disappointed, as if this had all played out strangely,

“What, you're _crying_ Sammy?”

He was like a lost boy ogling a broken toy. Piers sneered, his grin metallic and bloodthirsty,

“Oh poor little Sam Green, can't handle a little playground talk about his sister.”

Mark Maccam laughed neutrally, as if he hadn't been involved in this but felt no need to intervene. Piers added, aiming for the jugular,

“Or, maybe, its _true_!”

Sam's eyes flinched wide. Harry felt the expression seared into his brain, and he didn't get any flush of power. Instead he felt as if he were staring into his own gaze. The box screamed from within-

_hands red, flushed, on his neck, breath hot behind and on his ear, droplets of spit, as the pendulum of thrust-beat-thrust pounded into his body,_

“ _Oh, fuck... pretty little piece of-”_

-He slammed it shut. It banged out like a gunshot in his head, ricocheted. Any dregs of satisfaction or terror drained away. He was a devoid being; vacant.

Harry opened his eyes, a faint wordless smile on his lips. Sam had ensconced himself in the classroom, in the embrace of the teacher's protection. Dudley beamed to Harry and they walked in together. Before Harry sat down at his desk his cousin commented,

“Sick burns Harry!”

The dark slither of pleasure that oozed like gangrene in his chest was unfeigned. He returned Dudley's smile, his lips made of glass.

-o-

Harry Potter's hands kneaded the soil gently. It was a tender action; to touch the bosom of the Earth. The vessel of which all life grew from. He almost felt as if he intruded on something sacred. His body thrummed with its whimsical energy. If it weren't fiercely _not allowed_ and dangerous Harry may pose that it was due to the m-word. He may be an object of subtle rebellion at times, but the _m-word_ was an unquestioned law.

_He who liveth under the laws of the Dursleys must taketh such laws unto himself._

Harry slipped a secret smile into his box, his face a slate of icy marble. He was in Aunt Petunia's garden, caressing and executing lush stalks of green, under the fine eye of the woman herself. There was no room now for mistakes; no smiles could slide onto his face.

Relations with Aunt Petunia reached from amicable to servile. Harry was no fool; he had not deluded himself into believing the wicked lady held any _actual_ care for him. It was more a fondness for a pet, faint, tenuous. One shit on the family's special rug and Harry would be sent to the pound to be euthanized, so he did not test his luck.

“Very nice Harry.”

Aunt Petunia gifted him a winsome smile, her lip-stick lips reaching up sincerely. Harry sculpted his face into a gracious smile, patting the soil down humanely, whilst responding sweetly,

“Oh thank you Auntie, coming from you that truly means a lot.”

“Auntie” was an endearment Harry had begun to utilise and profit off upon realising its softening nature. Case and point, _Auntie_ Petunia's polite smile disintegrated into a fully fledged genuine grin. She took a hefty sip of a her Earl Grey Tea and returned to observing him from over her book; _Pride and Prejudice_.

The Neighbourhood Ladies' Book Club had restored her place in it. A few years previously she had been excommunicated from the reading syndicate due to, in her view, “flagrant jealousy.” Of course, upon listening to the grape vine – or Mrs. Green's loud barks from her balcony, with a bottle of gin in one hand and menacing grin in the other, about his Aunt's incompetence and illiteracy – Harry came to the conclusion that it was due to Aunt Petunia's inherent laziness, and stinginess in regards to the actual reading involved as a member of a book club. Currently, she was reinstated. _Reformed, one may say_ Harry joked cynically, comparing his own “reformation” to his aunt's with relish.

In Aunt Petunia's words they had outgrown their jealousy. In Harry's opinion they had been swayed by Aunt Petunia's new shiny _Cultivated Garden of 88'_ Trophy for the Surrey Floriculture Competition, within the subsection of the Horticulture Competition. In other words, the book gathering desired more prestige and suddenly Aunt Petunia could boast from the roof tops about her green thumbs.

The two continued to garden into the late afternoon; or Harry did, and Aunt Petunia attempted to tackle her first slab of literature. _Pride and Prejudice_ turned out to be more wordy than one expected for a romance. In her mind she cursed whoever had written such trash – Harry could see the scorn on her face.

She tended to lack any and all appreciation for literature, a trait that Dudley had seemingly inherited if one judged him by the school's grading system and not Uncle Vernon's criteria of a “genius”; which concerned itself with being related to said Dursley and the corruption of the school. Harry, of course, would outwardly fervently agree with the assessment, _of course_ the school is _terribly unfair_ in their _grades of poor little Dudders_. Said patriarch would then instruct him to complete Dudley's set of homework. Harry would do so, shrinking as expected (it was better to follow the same script nowadays, rebelling against his uncle was a mistake he had left in his youth upon leaving Jeff's grave) under his Uncle Vernon's gaze as he made his way to his cousin's room.

Sitting next to Dudley on the pristinely vacuumed carpet of his cousin, he scribbled frantically as he forged Dudley's handwriting. His own homework lay completed under his mattress under the stairs. For his own work, he tended to simply just skip half the questions to manufacture his desired grade; Harry was coasting on 'D's now as a safety precaution for if Uncle Vernon ever deemed 'C's too _brainy_.

“Hey, sorry you've got to do my math Harry.”

Dudley apologised, slightly abashed, as he smashed the keys of his Sega-Genesis. Harry shrugged with one shoulder, squinting at a difficult algebra equation. He muttered under his breath some mathematical nonsense concerning “x” and “y”, and Dudley wondered absently in his mind why Maths suddenly included English. He continued to speak, his stubby fingers quickening as the boss-level neared,

“I mean, I get that the school's unfair and all with the grades, but I don't see why _you_ have to do it. You're my best friend! Maths is for nerds, and you're pretty cool now.”

Harry nodded absently as he simplified, his eyes flicking up for a moment to make certain that his cousin was appropriately immersed in his game and wouldn't lash out. He needed to present a countenance of interest just in case Dudley took offence to his focus on Maths; his cousin tended to like being centre of attention. Dudley nodded resolutely to himself, feeling like his point had been made.

-o-

Harry let out a breath of relief. The welcoming claustrophobia of the local library squeezed into him from all sides. Inside a crevasse of books, shelves screeching as he crawled in between, Harry cradled a Year 8 Science Textbook on his lap. His eyes roved the pages with wide-eyed intrigue he only ever allowed out when in the privacy of his cocoon of the library. His fingers traced the pages as the information on atomic structures to the distinct states of matter absorbed into his flourishing mind. At school, he could never allow himself to indulge, but, having evaded another persistent invite to _go out_ (ie. Dudley speak for beat up innocent children) with his 'gang' of friends, he had snuck out to the library.

_If Uncle Vernon finds out about this..._ the warning voice in his mind left the sentence hanging. Harry's heart thundered in his chest, but he continued, desperate for mental nourishment. _Sometimes you need to take a risk_ Harry consoled the ghoul in his heart that hissed as a resident of Surrey wandered past _or that's not really living_.

The ghoul quietened down, settling silently in his gut. But, Harry knew it was still there, a guard for his box and a defender of his life. It was right, this was needlessly reckless, but he was only human and science sung out to him like a siren. _After all, there was no more Jeff to talk to,what was Harry supposed to do?_

He blinked behind wide glasses, rubbing his eyes before flicking the page again, the words dancing through the passages of his mind. _**As a revision for last year** : there are three states of matter; gas, liquid and solid, and all three can interchange between themselves. This process is related to Single Phase Changes. When traversing from solid to liquid this process is called fusion or melting, and from liquid to gas is called vaporisation or evaporation. Please take a look at this handy diagram beneath to better understand. These changes in state can be achieved by heating or cooling, this is because-_

“Excuse me, darling?”

Harry felt his bones freeze. He was a complete statue as the voice wafted over him; malfunctioning from fear. His body slowly resurrected the function of breathing, and he lifted green petrified eyes to the shadow of a lady cast over his figure. Harry was frozen in this horrific crime-scene; book open in his lap, glasses falling down his nose, wide eyed guilt. He was caught. He was done for. It was all over; this whole ruse had sealed his fate as a corpse. He may as well end himself here and now.

_Shut up and calm down, this will never be over_ whispered the ghoul. Harry listened, desperate, and reasserted himself to the category of “okay” rather than “falling down a well of despair”. He let a beautific smile grace his lips, and blinked owlishly at the figure standing above him. Every inch of his body itched to run from this heinous circumstance, but he did not dare, instead he waited.

Delphine Green, glorious goddess that she was, winked him a crooked smile,

“Darling, whatcha doing down there in the dirt?”

Her voice was like honey. She oozed sex, from the high slash of her skirt on thigh to the padded bra that beckoned eyes like a beacon through the night. Delphine Green was a walking embodiment of sin.

Harry felt disgusted, and simultaneously had the urge to avert his entire being from her, as if she were a contagion. He couldn't imagine anyone _willingly_ drawing gazes to them. _Pathetic,_ agreed that dark volcanic rage inside him upon noticing her thick red lips emphasised by make up. How old was this girl, fourteen?

“Oh, ma'am, I didn't see you there.”  
  


Harry infused as much innocent whimsy as he could get away with. Delphine softened before him, _easy_ snorted his internal monologue, and knelt down beside him. She peered at the chapter title of his book; _Chapter One: Revision of Basic Scientific Concepts._ Delphine cooed,

“Oh, sweetie, how lovely, looking up all that fancy scientific shit?”

Harry nodded, and urged his body to puff with pride. A suspicious look graced her face,

“...how old are you?”

Harry felt his heart thundering, but forced it to silence easily enough. He smiled charmingly, and chirruped, aging himself by a few years,

“Twelve, of course.”

Delphine relaxed minutely, as if the world had righted itself. Harry peered at her, she seemed to glow when she loosened. From her place on the ground she manoeuvred herself body so that she was sitting cross legged. She observed him carefully,

“So, any particular reason you're suffocated between two shelves instead of at any of the library desks?”

Harry blinked, as if naïve, before letting a pacifying smile grace his lips. Delphine's paranoid expression persisted, so he rambled,

“Oh, ma'am, I simply like this corner of the library! Its lovely to have a little place of my own to sit a read, surely you can understand that?”

Delphine hummed, and leant her body against the shelves. Her dress rode up, and Harry spied a yellow splotch of yellow on the inside of her upper thigh. He shifted uncomfortably; he had the same bruise. Harry didn't like the thought that he and Delphine shared any commonalities. The elder girl watched him with an equal amount of fascination,

“Don't I know you from somewhere?”

Harry titled his head, causing thick untamable locks to shroud his face, hoping that it could circumvent her imminent discovery of his identity. He genially remarked,

“Ma'am, I don't suppose we have. I'd never forget such a lovely girl.”

Delphine eyed him for a second, as if analysing his words, before understanding reached her eyes. She crawled forward, her breasts bouncing obscenely as she did so, right in front of him so that they were eye level. Their noses touched, and she said the incriminating words loud and clear,

“ _Harry fucking Potter_! I thought I knew your sorry arse, sitting there all curled up like a munchkin. Oh no, but that's not true at all, you're a delinquent, a savage, aint that right? Or, perhaps its only the rumour mill, perhaps they're so wrong about poor little Harry, huh?”

Harry resisted the urge to flinch back from her close proximity. The heat of her chest pressed against his curled up knees uncomfortably, and he instinctively straightened his legs down to the floor so that they no longer touched. He stared her in the eyes, a wave of numbness drowning his fears. The heat of her body reminded him of Sunday Evenings, and he felt the world slip away.

_Swirls of ice drifted around him, ephemeral, untouched. As pure as snow. Drifting, sedate and graceful in the whirlwinds of time. He could never quite realise the world. He stood breaths away. He was a boy adrift from a body, simply a floating head in space. He felt nor heard nothing, he was a slip of blankness, gently walking-_

“Potter! Potter, wake up, snap out of it!”

Hands shook his shoulders roughly and Harry blinked. His body felt like a cloud, pins and needles flushed him in a tight embrace. He watched with narrowed eyes as his body regained substance and the daintily painted nails of one Delphine Green surfaced him from his mental solitude. She continued to rattle him like a maraca. Harry broke her from her trance,

“I'm okay, what are you doing?”

He aimed for incredulous, perhaps he could salvage this disaster of a day after all. Delphine didn't buy any of the snake oil he was selling, and simply slumped down beside him,

“Where'd you go, kid?”

Harry didn't meet her eyes. He felt like his world was being pulled out from beneath him, he hated being out of control,

“What do you mean? I'm right here.”

Delphine laughed humourlessly, her eyes crinkling attractively. She shoved him lightly on the shoulder, and Harry suppressed a wince from contact with one of his bruises. Delphine cajoled roughly,

“I may be a minor, Potter, but I wasn't born yesterday. I know that look, okay? So, tell me where you went, it won't hurt anyone.”

Harry stared down at his knees. If talking couldn't dissuade her then he may as well simply wait until she left him alone. Delphine clearly couldn't be trusted. First of all, she was a complete and utter stranger. Secondly, she had already pressed her boob against his knee, she simply wasn't sane.

Delphine husked in his ear, clearly loving every second of his torment,

“Not speaking, hmm? Little itty Potter doesn't like to talk about things, yeah? Get an original story, son. I already know yours. Trust me, you're not special, you're just a wimp. You get bullied, little Potter? Your cousin beats you a little. That's _nothing_ , you hear me? You don't get to be sad about that, that _doesn't matter_.”

Anger bubbled in Harry's chest, so hot and heavy it burned. A maelstrom of fear flooded him sharply, it was an acute feeling, this concentrated terror. It felt like all his life was unravelling beneath his fingers. All he wanted was to fade into nothing, to never breach the surface of reality ever again. _No_ harshly corrected the ghoul _speak up_. Harry only wished to huddle up in on himself and let Delphine's acerbic words wash over him, but the ghoul forbade him. _Talk to her, now, or she will think you are weak. It is hurt or get hurt, Harry, so hurt her_.

Harry's eyes lifted to meet Delphine's mountainous sky-blue orbs. She had the kind of eyes who you wouldn't catch in case you drowned in them; molten. He whispered a single word, ending her tirade,

“Slut.”

Delphine rocked back, as if she had been dealt a blow. Her face professed her shock, open and trembling; she was putty in Harry's hand. She clearly hadn't expected Harry's response. He smiled at her cruelly, she thought she could harm him, well, he'd _show_ her,

“That's why you're doing this, right? Because you feel inadequate. Its why you do all the shit you do, right? The reason you fuck your way through all of Surrey.”

Delphine laughed at him, but Harry could see the upset in her eyes. She was an injured doe, food for the sharks of the world. Harry could almost smell her blood, and she _had_ baited him. No one could blame him for a little vengeance. _That's right, Harry_ confirmed the ghoul.

“What would you know, _little boy_? You've probably never even _kissed_ a girl, you're probably just a little scared child lashing out!”

The putrid colour of the bruise on hi- her thigh flickered to the forefront of Harry's mind. He let out a skeleton grin, there was no life in it at all,

“Or, is there another reason you feel the need to crowd small children in libraries? Is-”

It was in this moment where Harry took a swing in the dark. Truly, it could have been done by anyone, man or woman, related or otherwise, but there was a certain madness in Delphine's eyes that convinced him that _this_ was her truth. And _no_ it wasn't because they were similar, he _wasn't_ projecting.

_Aren't you?_ Said the ghoul, without judgement.

“- _Daddy_ not so kind when poor innocent Delphine goes to sleep?”

Delphine froze, the epitome of rigidity. Harry could have brushed against her fragility and she would have collapsed into herself, like a building crumbling to the ground. She simply wasn't structurally sound. Her eyes flickered to him, desperately, in a prayer that he would cease. _Please no_ her eyes begged.

Harry felt no shame in delivering the final blow, for he saw himself in her gaze and he could do whatever he wished to himself free of guilt. He belonged to himself, after all, you can't damage what was already yours. Its _yours_.

_Perhaps your uncle would say the same, Harry_ mused the ghoul, as if philosophising. Harry ignored it, what did _it_ know?

“Does daddy _fuck_ you well enough Delphine, or are you here to ask the neighbourhood delinquent for some help like you've asked every other boy in town?”

The vulgarity felt amazing, as if he had _finally oh finally_ unleashed his beast. Harry's box whined as winds flooded out. His veins flushed with power. Euphoria crowded him like the heat of breast on knee; it was something indescribable. Terrible, but great, like the sinking of a mountain into the sea.

The spot where Delphine had loitered in pulsed with vacancy. Harry returned his eyes to his book, victorious. No one had gotten hurt, after all. They were only words, words with power, but still _no one had gotten hurt_. For some indefinable reason that was critical.

-o-

_If he could describe the taste of this feeling, it would be saliva. This warm thick saliva clogged up his entire being; he barely noticed its taste most of the time, but if he focused he could realise that it was only the gustatory nature of the things he had already ate. Backwash. The flavour of the drift resembled reality, yet not quite. He could taste the bed on his tongue, he could feel the grip of it between his teeth, the soft downy fluff of a multicoloured resplendent quilt, if he zoned in on it perhaps he could even understand the sensation of his gut giving out, of his behind shrieking in sparks of pain. But, everything was distant, unobserved. Life existed through this translucent film, as if he were encased in bubblewrap. If one placed a hand on his cheek he could feel the pressure but not the skin; the warmth but not to texture. All he felt was the crinkle of plastic. The yawn of this fatigued wrap around him. It swirled, gentle and evanescent, digressing from head to hand to the tips of his prickling fingers. He felt at peace with the world, a single being among a flock of-_

It was a sharp pinch to his side, as if one had attached a metal monkey wrench to the tender flesh and clamped it on tight, twisting ruthlessly until a scream let loose. He endured the light caress of callouses against the outershell of his ribcage; the hand was warm, foreign and rebuking, as if to say _wake up silly_. Harry exuded this terrible tightness, stretched thin, the air flooding back into his lungs. He hadn't realised he had been holding his breath, how this awful tightness had started, and he hadn't known why; Harry knew now.

Oh, _he knew_.

It was Sunday Evening.

He was awake. Conscious. Alive. In reality. He could feel himself. The echoes of pain persisted; and so did the threat of further. Harry's insides ached in that awfully familiar pain, the one he only realised after the fact in the shower as he scrubbed and scrubbed raw, until the feeling of dirt left. Never this acute. Never this _warm and recognisable..._

_he felt the fade take his hand with a maternal sigh, affectionate and barely there. He could discern the residue of a breath on his cheek but it left, exited reality, like anything else, and the soft cocoon of bubblewrap embraced him again-_

“Boy, stop that!”

The slap was harsh and unforgiving. As quick as the flick of a whip. He barely felt it, but when he did it burned like fire, _a warm ember stirring in his chest..._

_This faded as the sweetness of drift encompassed him once more-_

“I said _stop that_!”

The voice roared against him. Spittle decorated his face like a macabre collage. Harry closed his eyes, not bearing to endure this. If only he could just disappear...

_into the warm kindness of his own inner sanctum, where all he felt was the crinkle of plas-_

“If you disappear _one more time_ then I will _kill_ you.”

The absolute calm of the voice was an honest promise. Harry could find the truthful boiling fury in _those eyes and it made him want to disappear from reality, and walk in one that-_

_No, open your eyes, no time for this_ the ghoul woke him this time as a hand wrapped around Harry's throat. Harry choked on the withdrawal of air, staring up into the belly of the beast, he couldn't breathe, the world was fading and he wasn't in control this time.

_Repeat after me_ said the ghoul, all monotone and expectant, as if it had predicted this exact outcome and was not surprised in the slightest. Harry nodded inside his head, horribly hopeful that the ghoul could solve this situation. He couldn't breathe. His lungs were beginning to burn, and an unfathomable constricting sensation pounded in his chest, as if someone were squeezing a hand around his heart and not around his throat.

_I'm awake_ the ghoul instructed.

Harry shook his head, begging to return to sleep, but the ghoul persisted, impatient and unforgiving. _I am awake, say it with me, I am awake_.

“I-I'm awake.”

Harry spluttered. The hand around his neck loosened its grip, transforming from certain death to a gentle reminder of the possibility of such. The devil loomed above him, a wordless malignant creature of no morality. The _beast_.

_Please don't hurt me_ said the ghoul. Harry was confused, what was he doing to it? The ghoul must have rolled its eyes, then it reiterated without sympathy, _no, you fool, say it; Please don't hurt me_.

“P-please don't h-hurt me.”

In his head the voice came out strong and sure, but between the channel of brain and lips something must have gotten lost in translation because it arrived all shaky. The malformed beast grinned, and whispered,

“I don't want to hurt you, Harry, I would _never_.”  
  


He knew it was a lie, it had to be, but something in his heart thumped hopefully at the words. The ghoul shushed him but Harry escaped the safety of its cement grip. Harry asked, breathless,

“R-really?”

The beast grinned a bloodthirsty toothy grin,

“Oh, yes, _never_. Just do as I say, Harry, and no one needs to get hurt.”

The ghoul gritted out drolly, _don't listen to him, he's lying Harry_.

He?

Harry stared at the demon and suddenly he _did_ see its gender. It was a man. Really? He could have sworn it were a monster. But, instead, layed out on a floral print of the bed he had folded and vacuumed that morning, was only a man. He had a beer gut. He had beard stubble, and his breath reeked of cheap beer. His hands were walking callouses, nails untrimmed, hair a golden bowl of brown yet dirty as if washed in sewage. His sex hung out, unabashed and an obvious reminder of him being _only_ a man; the weapon of desire yet also an ultimate weakness. Harry imagined that the man would not strangle him if he kicked him in the jewels, he thought long and hard on it. But, there was something else, on _it_ , the unnamed reminder that this was a man, on his _thing_ , it looked like... blood?

_You idiot_ said the ghoul.

Harry's eyes widened as memories flooded back and reality righted itself. This wasn't just any man. This was his uncle. Uncle Vernon, flabby but strong, stout, rotund, yet with power, with a firm hand, and he had the capacity to _exert_ his will over Harry, he did, and Harry knew it was true because down there, down down in the unmentionable place of _himself_ there was a throbbing which spoke, which belied that there, that Uncle Vernon, that this was not-

_a kiss of silence graced his cheek, unnamed and yet beautiful. He was returned to the tried and tired arms of the magnificent drift, just waiting for him to reunite, like a damsel in a tower. This drift swept him from the ground, he was flying, free as a bird, wind ruffling his feathers, trailing over the bridge of his spine-_

_Wake. Up._ The ghoul's voice roused him from sleep once more, somehow urgent, somehow no longer emotionless. The glint of a knife greeted Harry from his slumber, it shined sharp in the shadows of Aunt Petunia's favourite mood-light; a lamp with a trunk of a lion's paw covered in a maroon coloured lampshade that cast the room in a romantic glow. It felt so wrong for her lamp to be idly existing on their _shared_ end table as Uncle Vernon traced an amatory finger up the soft white underbelly of his inner thigh, his hot breath whispering in Harry's ear,

“...so, we can make an exchange...”  
  


And Harry didn't know what he was whispering, only that the ghoul was urging him to _speak, Harry, speak to him, reply, or he will strangle you again, speak_. But, he didn't know what to say. What could he say to this demon who shared his bed, who fondled the silken skin of his hip, who dragged his heady hand on- Harry thought he was going to throw up, his body revolted, his head dizzied, a high pitched ringing echoed in his head, reminded him that he hadn't been allowed to eat that day, that his uncle had _unfairly_ removed any allowance of food, and he was running on no food and Harry _just_ wanted to sleep and-

“...and, would it be so bad, Harry? I get _so_ bored with your regular starfish routine, just so lifeless. It wouldn't be so bad to just move around, to _kiss_ me. And, you get something out of it, _all_ the food you could like, as much as Dudley even, all you have to do is kiss me...”

_Do it_ said the ghoul.

Harry felt like laughing because that sounded like the peer pressure their teacher had so warned him about. _Miss, the voice in my head is peer pressuring me_ Harry sardonically groused to his elementary teacher in a mental scene of the classroom. He felt much joy in imagining her reaction, the shock on her face, her wide eyes. He would laugh at her.

Not that he didn't experience peer pressure, why, only yesterday Dudley had invited him on yet another gallant jaunt to the girl's bathroom! Oh how _unpressured_ Harry remained, how pure and innocent! _Miss, whatever could you mean you saw my uncle molest me? I'm sorry ma'am, but you are simply so mistaken, molest, what does that even mean?_

And there was a betrayal, as well, for he had trusted the ghoul, almost, he had followed the ghoul's rules, and this was what it suggested? He almost wanted to reply to the ghoul, to say _how dare you_ , but, but that would be _crazy_. It wasn't normal to have a voice in your head, one that _told you what to do_. To reply...? He couldn't... and yet...

_Kiss him. Get food. You need food. Do it._ The ghoul expanded on its initial thought.

His uncle's fingers were making him drowsy with their mellow evocative sweetness. So _soft_. He was never soft, ever. It was lulling him to sleep. And the ghoul said it would be okay, so, couldn't he just do it only once? Only once and never again? Would it really be so bad?

His body jerked, since his mind was not allowed to. Harry flung himself away from the bed, terrified and flinching like a wild injured animal. The demon rose from the bed, a rageful look on its malformed face. He flung out his hands, only a small boy against a mountain of flesh, but the beast swept him up, lifted him back onto the bed, growled harshly against his flesh,

“Now, that wasn't _nice_ , Harry.”

_Kiss him. Now. He will hurt you otherwise._ The ghoul suggested, apathetic to Harry's plight.

At least he had an observer of his misery, at least he wasn't alone in the secret. It was a little like Jeff even, if you thought about it, his own personal confidant as the ghoul. It was almost a privilege, to be honest, to have someone to talk to him while-

_Kiss him._ The ghoul had seemingly run out of patience, it was incredibly short with Harry.

“...oh, you'll _pay_ for this boy, certainly, you'll _pay_ for your audacity, your disrespect, you'll _never forget_ who is in charge here-”

The knife glinted in a cruel reminder of the world he lived in. There was no escape, only a door that led to his cousin. A cousin that would sell him down the river for a new playstation. And out of this house, where did that lead? It led to the police, to the ER, to Jeff's grave, to Dudley's death, to everyone dead because someone needed to see him suffer, because there were _powers that be_ that wished him to be in pain. And Harry was just a single boy against a beast of a world, and there were no exits, what could he _do_?

He wasn't even allowed to slip out of reality.

The box rattled in his chest, but he smothered it, killed it so it would no longer speak. _Look_ where rage had gotten him! _Look_ where pain had gotten him! Only back on the bed. _Just be_ _quiet Box!_ He felt burning power in his fingertips, but he knew it was the same madness that had conjured up the ghoul that made him feel like he had a chance. There were no more second chances, no more exits. All roads led back to this moment, and Harry had an inescapable fate. His stars were already writ. His lips were already wetted by his terror; at least his eyes were dry, at least he hadn't cried. And, his uncle was polishing the knife, there was no escape except this.

“O-okay, I'll k-ki-kiss you.”

He felt so small in that moment, as if his entire body had shrunk to the size of a thimble, an insignificant piece to be held in Uncle Vernon's palm. He was a diminished Batman. Surely even Batman lost sometimes? He liked to think of it like that, as if he were simply an antihero with heroic traits, an oxymoron. He could think of it like that.

Harry leaned his head up, readying himself. The rage that had once shone so unbridled in his uncle's eyes mellowed,

“ _There_ , that wasn't so hard.”

The ghoul consoled him bluntly, _at least he hasn't asked for a blow job yet._ Harry, somehow, felt a little better. There was a witness for his misery, even if it took the form of a ghoul. Someone cared enough to watch as his uncle leant forward, and their relationship shifted.

-o-

_The sky was a beautiful abyss above him, an abyss in his skin, he stretched on forever. There was no feeling in anything, it was all simply walking puppets stranded on an island, the whoosh of an island, he was a disconnected whirr, a swirl of numbness, snow upon an infected wound that would never-_

“Hey, guys, guess what I found!”

Harry sat, hunched, on the bright lushness of the school oval. Dudley and co. circled him like a fairyring. Harry found himself drifting off into nothing more often, in school time and when doing chores, in times he wasn't _meant to_ be nothing, ever since he and his uncle's change in dynamic. Being in reality on Sunday Evenings really took its toll, as was the impending doom of perhaps Friday Evenings or Wednesday Evenings becoming a possibility. It all hinged on Aunt Petunia's book club sessions, when she was out or not; and wasn't that a laughable thought, that Harry's sanity depended on his Aunt's loyalty to a literary institution. Heaven forbid if she ever become involved in any actual tertiary institution! Harry may actually need to resign from this whole rape victim business if that happened. _Oh what a shame that would be_ he revelled the dark humour of potentially just dying. _Oh that would spoil Uncle Vernon's plans, for sure_.

Their circle of friends expanded as Mark Maccam sauntered forward with four polaroids in his clammy grip. He was as suave and detached as always. Harry had a suspicion that he was a sociopath or something, but deigned not to comment.

“Mark, stop!”

That was Sam Green's terror from the third spot of the circle. Funnily enough, for a boy who sounded to be in deep distress, he did not move from his place in the circle; statue still. Harry side-eyed him, musing that it may be in relation to his recent bouts of fear concerning Dudley's gang. Ever since his grapple for dominance with Harry, and the dealings of incest accusations and homosexual allegations, he had returned to his passive, silent self that camouflaged with any backdrop. Chameleon Sam, Harry thought the name suited him.

Dudley intruded,

“Hand 'em over, Mark, I'm int'rested.”

In regards to Dudley, he had begun to add impromptu apostrophes into all of his words, spouting off the drawl of those older junkies he interacted with. His repertoire including; 'em, s'what, g'way, d'n'care, and the ever annoying yet incurable _whatevs_. His collection of illegally obtained game consoles was growing, also. Harry noticed the NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) among the pile. It was one from 1988. The very same year Jeff had gained _his_ NES as a reparation for his mother's negligence and plate-to-wall playdate. He wasn't made of stone, _yet_ posed the ghoul, and he admitted to a twinge in his heart. Jeff would always be a part of his soul; his only friend.

The mystery photos shifted ownership. Dudley's eyes widened as he flicked through them, a wicked smirk painting his features. The boy next to him, called Paul or Prat or something ponce-like, leant over and almost drooled on the images, like a dog to a piece of rotting flesh. Harry noticed Sam was folding in on himself, like a faulty camping chair, and whispering some sort of prayer into his hands. _Probably, thou shalt not be a dingus_ Harry snickered in his head, a delayed ache presenting itself in recollection to Sam's use of “ _queer_ ”. Ever since he had begun to experience Uncle Vernon's deeds with open eyes again, well, let's just say Harry has gathered a sensitivity for being called “ _queer”_.

_I'm so fucking queer_ Harry thought with remembrance to the incriminating hickey on his neck and these uncontrollable _feelings_ that stirred unbidden in his gut. _I'm as faggy as they come. The gayest of them all. Homosexual of the year, that's my name, my true title among the other gay beings. I rule over all gays with my gayness. Fuck, I'm going to hell_. He may be silently laughing to himself, it may be hysterical laughter.

Piers whistled as Dudley began to hand out the polaroids like candies,

“Where'd you get _these_ Marky? Is someone more devious than we all thought, shall we host a raid in your honour?”

By _raid_ Piers meant invading the girl's bathroom and prancing about like dorks, because they were all too young to drink or smoke, or at least none of them could pass for an age when they could passably illegally drink, and none of the girls actually _gave_ a damn since they just did their business in the stalls. The most the boys could do was leer as they plaited their hair, which wasn't very threatening. Plaits were tough as fuck, after all, real warrior stuff. They could also wash their hands with the better soap; to be honest most of their _raids_ consisted of better hygiene and faint envy. Harry considered sending a serious complaint to the school administration, because the boy's bathroom didn't even have a single bar of soap, let alone lavender scented soap in spades. They were deprived.

_Oh, you're so brilliant about speaking of broken laws_ he snickered in self deprecation, considering, perhaps cruelly, the image of Jeff being slammed against a door by his mother and Harry saying nothing because of his own pathetic fears. He was truly a sham of a boy.

_And you actually like it when Uncle Vernon..._ Harry was about to make a crack about _it_ but felt his mental voice fall flat. His stomach sunk down to his knees. He couldn't breathe.

_No, stop Harry_ said the ghoul, the final word on the matter. Harry leant against the mysterious mental figure, barely escaping his thoughts unscathed, returning to reality as the conversation progressed.

“I found them in little _Sammy's_ locker!”

Crowed Mark triumphantly, leaning back on his heels as he took in their gratifying glances. Sam sunk further into his hands as Piers cackled,

“My gosh, we all thought Harry was _wrong_ , but its _true_ , aint it? You're fucking your _sister_!”

Sam crawled away from them, stumbling and desperate. They could all see the tears in his eyes. Harry did nothing, he just watched as Piers decimated the poor boy. It was like a David Attenborough documentary; _and then the lion catches the antelope between its teeth..._ He was watching a bloodbath, it was invigorating.

_Let someone else hurt_ Harry thought.

_Yes, Harry, its hurt or be hurt_ confirmed the ghoul, thoughtlessly.

“No, no I swear!”

Sam defended hopelessly, crying into his hands. Dudley looked on aghast. It was the same expression as Aunt Petunia when Ripper came over and shat on the rug, a large smelly pile of faeces; as if the world had just been set aflame.

“You're _crying_ Sam.”

Dudley reminded, sickened. Harry recalled Uncle Vernon's thoughts on crying with a shiver; he remembered a specific instance of his own tears and his uncle's righteous belt that had responded to them _quite fervently_.

Sam desperately wiped at his wet weakness, whilst Piers sneered,

“Its just so sickening, Sam, we just _care so much_ about your poor innocence. Truly, fucking your sister, its just demonic. We really worry for your soul.”

Sam shook his head, over and over,

“No. No I never, I would never. I j-just found the photos, i-in my dad's cupboard, and, and, I didn't want him... to have them. I di-didn't _want_ -”

Harry observed blankly as Sam the Chameleon broke down further, choking on his words. It was pitiful, truly, this boy fractured at simply a _glimpse_ of the truth of pain. He was a weakling; Harry lived it, you didn't see _Harry_ crying. How dare this boy be so hurt by _seeing_ it? Hell, Sam should have laughed at his sister's plight, he should have laughed and taunted her. Delphine was a _slut_ , she deserved what she got, how _dare_ she be allowed to-

_the abyss held him and the feelings slowly leaked from his body, like pus from a wound. He layed back and relaxed in the sanctity of haziness, his mind whitewashed, a single blank sheet of nothing, an empty sky, it was truly holy to feel-_

_Pay attention_ uttered the ghoul, ever present, ever cautious.

Harry realised Piers was handing him a polaroid. A naked picture. A naked picture of Delphine.

His hand grasped it motionlessly, as if time had slipped between his fingers. He flicked the edge of it, tuckered the white plastic, it felt a little like the sensation of bubblewrap. Piers prodded,

“Aren't you going to _look_ , Harry, or was Sammy right about you being queer?”

Harry blinked expressionlessly, his eyes drifting down. He roved the shores of Delphine's bared body. She truly was a goddess, he knew that much. Her eyes were closed; maybe she had been drugged. Her lips were open, painted in the whiteness of royalty. The buttons on her shirt were loose, hanging, on the precipice of open but not quite. He thought he spied a slit of nipple, a warm red areola blaring out from the inscrutable tableau of her demise. She was timeless here, her fourteen years absent as she layed splayed out and wrecked.

Piers smirked, lips like razors,

“That one aint nothing, wait until you see the _last_ one. Oh, mamma mia!”

Piers smacked his lips dramatically, and Mark laughed deeply. Harry felt that laugh reverberate in the ground; it shook. He glanced down at the polaroid and noticed his fingers were shaking faintly.

_Still_ warned the ghoul _they're wolves. Show weakness and they'll eat you alive._

Harry didn't know how to feel looking at this picture of crime. That's what this was. This was evidence. This was a crime-scene.

_Say something, Harry, say she's a slut_ said the ghoul, taking note of the surrounding enemies.

Harry chuckled hollowly, his fingers trailing down the image like the page of a science textbook,

“What a slut.”

Her unconsciousness really blared at him as he defamed Delphine's name. But, Harry was walking in a corridor without any exit signs, trailing in the dark with the ghoul as his only guide. Where was those who policed his speech when he was strewn up on the floral bedspread being eaten alive? Let him have something, at least.

“Yeah...”  
  


Dudley had an indecipherable expression. Harry thought his brain might have finally expanded. He commented,

“...I d'n know guys, I mean, the lads up at the mall... they say it s'not cool to...”

Advice from the older and wise, Harry presumed, that had at least a basic moral compass. Mark shrugged from his position in the circle, not a commentator. Piers' beady eyes winked through the haze of sunlight,

“What, Duds, those boys pressuring you?”

Dudley shook his head,

“No... No, it s'nothing.”

Sam twitched slightly from his regression on the ground. Harry peered at him lifelessly, _quaint_. His heart had spaced out from the rest of thing. Everything was being filmed in black and white.

_Pay attention_ said the ghoul. Harry's back straightened. He mused that it was awfully inconvenient that the ghoul never brought him back during school, but Harry supposed it was unimportant.

Another polaroid slipped into his hand. It was the ticket.

He looked up, thoughts dawning on him like dappled sun breaking the day,

“Hey, can I keep this?”

Piers smirked, as if his reality had been assured after Dudley's temporary pause in the realm of immorality,

“Sure, Harry.”  
  


He twisted around to look at Dudley, and elbowed his friend,

“ _See_. Harry gets it, don't you?”

Dudley appeared conflicted. Harry caressed the photo in his hand, hope burning in his chest. _Finally_ Harry thought, _finally_.

-o-

He wasn't sure what he wanted to say, but it was now or never.

“999, Surrey police department, what's your emergency?”

A feminine voice echoed through the phone. For a few moments, Harry lost the ability to speak, but he realigned himself and answered, voice faint,

“Hi.”

He was painfully aware of how young and frail he sounded.

“Hello there, are you okay? How can I assist you today?”

Harry stuttered, suddenly incredibly nervous,

“I w-would... I...”

_Get it together_ said the ghoul.

Harry solidified, certainty crawling through his bones.

“Hello? Is everyone okay?”

The female voice haunted his ear. He finally answered after a few uncountable moments, what he had been rehearsing in his head for many unfathomable hours,

“Hi, I would like to report a crime. A-an assault, rape, of Delphine Green. Its spelt D-E-L-P-H-I-N-E, and I have proof.”

-o-

Dudley had shiftily glanced at Harry in Science seven times, stared for far too long at dinner, and had been telepathically badgering his best friend/cousin for three solid minute as they sat side by side in Dudley's room. Harry was scrawling out faltering math answers, he didn't know if he could assure a perfect score on this homework since he had been so out of touch and falling behind in the past few weeks. Dudley metaphorically elbowing him constantly wasn't helping matters either; he seemed consumed by some sort of rampant prepubescent emotion.

_What if its sexual?_ said a paranoid terrified voice Harry usually preferred to keep in the stocks and throw mental tomatoes at. It was usually erratic and nonsensical. Harry didn't think he could handle another Dursley man liking him in such a way. Sure, the beatings had become sporadic, but trust him, _it wasn't worth it_.

_Please, just end my misery and tell me_ Harry begged telepathically as Dudley bit into his lip, dying horrendously against the dragon boss he was duelling. If his gaming skill suffered one knew this was of serious consequence.

_Please, let it not be sexual_ Harry pleaded, as his cousin gnawed on his lip.

_Don't beg_ said the ghoul, listless.

“H-harry?”

Dudley was nervous.

_Oh god, its sexual, isn't it?_ The paranoid voice and Harry became one and the same. He would positively die if it was sexual. The ghoul facepalmed somewhere off in the ether of Harry's mind. Summed up, the ghoul could “not _even_...”.

“Yes?”

Harry tried to keep his voice calm, but his teeth were chattering with anxiety. He wanted to crawl out of his skin. Everything itched in shame and terror.

“I-I've been thinking, about, Delphine...”  
  


_Oh no_ thought Harry as his cousin set down the controller. The terribly pixelated dragon on the screen loomed like it wanted nothing more than to molest and devour them both. _Don't let the dragon molest me, Dudley. Please don't molest me. I thought we were supposed to be best friends, or were you pretending too?_

“...a-and I don't think its _right_. Dad is always saying that there is _right_ and there is _wrong_. And, okay, she's a slut, yeah... but its not right if she says no! And, and, I talked to Gerald as well, one of the boys from the mall, and _he_ said that _no_ means _no_ , and I think, I think... that's what I think. And, if you don't like it Harry, then, then I don't know if we should b-be friends!”

Harry thought it was atrocious irony that Dudley's father, the man who had repeatedly raped him, had somehow instilled a moral of sexual consent in his son. He felt like laughing hysterically in some deformed brand of relief. It wasn't about him! Dudley just wanted to stay friends, and didn't like that Harry had been basically letting rape slide before. Dudley didn't _want_ him.

_Oh god I'm an idiot_ Harry thought, ruefully.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, deadpan.

Harry consoled the now anxious Dudley who had nearly bitten clear through his lip; he had taken Harry's silence as some sort of perverted answer in the affirmative. He finished up an equation, whilst saying,

“Okay Dudley, I can see what you mean. What can I say, you've converted me? Rape is bad, so I won't jerk off to the pictures of Delphine or anything.”

That was probably what Dudley assumed he had done. It was what the other boys had done; gone home and wanked over an unconscious girl. Or, Piers at least, if his bragging had possessed any truth whatsoever. Harry had in fact used the most incriminating photo, of a completely naked defiled Delphine, as evidence for a court case against Mr. Green and his wife, but what did that matter for Dudley's opinion of him when that action was completely secret? In the end, it had turned out that Mrs. Green, alcoholic layabout, had also been involved. Let us say she had a knack for photography and was essentially morally bankrupt. Aunt Petunia would have a field day boasting about Mrs. Green's shortcomings in the future when the news broke.

Ironic that Aunt Petunia was no better and would most likely insert herself into Mrs. Green's vacancy. Ironic that she was becoming an alcoholic, her quantity of wine growing as Uncle Vernon's interest in _her_ waned. The prim and proper Aunt Petunia losing her sanity, oh the irony.

Dudley grinned maniacally, even at Harry's lackluster semi-sardonic response, and returned to his gaming. Harry chewed the end of his graphite and thought he needed to study more since leaving eighty blank spaces on his latest test had garnered him the suspicions of Mr. Veneer in the latest Staff Meeting (the old man with a now-silver goatee, had been cryptically watching Harry as he hung about with Dudley and his miscreants on the top ovals). Mr. Veneer's conjectures could lead to nothing good, and even if Harry _were_ experiencing a rough patch with his uncle's latest tricks it was no excuse for slacking. Even idiots could see that perfect results bar unanswered questions were suspect, thus Surrey's educational representatives would catch on soon enough after they had removed head from sand.

-o-

Torn asunder, that would be how he would describe this moment in the future.

He was a hounded child, cooped up in this skin that despised him so. Tears streaked down his cheeks, and he pawed at his eyes, begging for reprieve, but the tears would not stop. They never did. He couldn't breathe. His chest was shutting down. His whole body felt sticky and shaking, he was rattled. Harry couldn't do this anymore, he just couldn't. Fuck this. Fuck everyone. Fuck everything. He didn't want to _feel_ anymore. He didn't want to _exist_ in this fucking hell hole.

He stumbled to the kitchen.

_Stop, Harry_ shouted the ghoul, self preservation evident.

But, the ghoul was just a voice, lost in the storm of his incoming life. This pain was eternal. He was going to be here forever. It was hurt or be hurt. And he needed it to stop. He didn't want to hurt. And he could never hurt Uncle Vernon; he was just too big. He was a mountain of a man, a living monster, nothing could touch him.

_Put down the knife_ warned the ghoul, trying to talk him out of it.

The knife. This knife. The object of so much fear. _This_ fucking knife, held above him like never ending leverage.

“Oh, _Harry_ , you _won't_ suck your uncle's cock, well, here is a _knife_ to your neck!”

He cackled, a loud and boisterous laugh. True cheer. He pressed the knife against his arm, it hurt, it burned like his chest was on fire, like he was exploding outwards, but he continued on, trying to dig down away from this horror.

“Oh _Harry_ you _refuse_ to let some old gross man fuck you with a smile on your face? Oh, you _horrid_ boy, please, go to your cupboard. Oh yes, because you live _in a cupboard_. That's _so_ normal. My god, that's just the _normalest_ thing ever! Put him in a cupboard, please, we just can't handle the boy, he's a mess of a boy, shove him in the cupboard, but oh no! He has to do some math homework? Oh _no_ , better let him do the math homework _in the cupboard_ , and oh no, not again! We forget that this poor little boy is a whore, make sure to sneak into the cupboard and molest him, _please_ , we beg you, _molest him_!”

“Harry?”

He flicked his eyes up, grinning wide as Uncle Vernon entered the room. Harry made sure to lift his arm, as if it was a symbol of pride to show off. A school report to show off, finally. His uncle's eyes widened as another slice dug into the skin, sharp bullets of pain scraping up Harry's arm. Harry mimed, loving this moment,

“ _Oh no Harry_ , what are you doing, you silly boy, I go fuck you for hours and you're _not_ okay? Well, that's just absurd! You're such a silly little boy. Come here, I'll come fuck you again and that will fix this! _Oh no_ did that not work? Why am I so _surprised_?”

His uncle rushed forward, concern etched onto his face, as if Harry actually _meant_ something to him. Harry giggled. This was all just the grandest joke, the loveliest time! Oh, what a jolly old time they had, he and his uncle. He whispered seductively into his uncle's ear as the rogue flush of blood poured onto both of their faces, hooking his arms around his neck,

“This is what you wanted right? Me, like this, just _desperate_ for you. _Oh please Uncle Vernon_ , take me with your monster cock, oh just _please_ , I'll simply _die_ without it!”

Harry cackled at it all, the knife still going deep. Uncle Vernon struggled against him, trying to remove his hand, but Harry continued, deeper still.

_Come on_ he thundered, as the pain intensified. The flow of blood increased. He had the most sickening premonition that he would have to clean the kitchen come morning. His right arm had begun to ache from sawing at the flesh, he was only a boy after all. His uncle tried to separate arm from arm,

“Stop, Harry!”

Harry shouted back,

“ _WHY!_ ”  
  


Because _why_ should he stop? So that Uncle Vernon could go on and molest him again? _No thank you_. It was better this way. This was the only way.

“S-stop, _please_ , Harry!”  
  


It was the most miraculous thing.

Harry stared wide-eyed as tears streaked down his uncle's withered cheeks. He had done it. Finally. Without ever intending to. He had cracked the code of his uncle.

Uncle Vernon; monster, propensity for sadism, liked anal sex, _had feelings?_

Harry saw past the film of reality and into his uncle's soul. This devilish figure who had drowned his life for so long was finally at his mercy. This atrocious example of a human had... followed the same path as Aunt Petunia. Uncle Vernon had grown a cancer, a tumour in his skull, a sickness of _amicability_. He had experienced an onset case of _fondness_ for Harry. It was the perfect tool, the perfect escape from never ending torture. Harry paused in his suicide attempt, to contemplate,

“I won't stop.”  
  


He said it firmly.

His uncle's face cracked before him, like a stone slab fractured on a pillar of metal. He was holding Harry's hands and crying into his face. He pleaded like a shadow of the monster he had once been,

“ _Please don't Harry_...”  
  


_How pitiful_ Harry decided _Uncle Vernon of the past would be so ashamed. To think, him, in love with a ten year old freak_.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, having sensed that death would not be forthcoming tonight if Harry's plans played out correctly.

“I won't stop _unless_ -”

The moment the word _unless_ left Harry's lips it was as if hope had been restored to his uncle's life. He had become the man's saving grace, his salvation, along with his ruining. Imagine finding love and wreckage in the heat of a child, it was horrifically hilarious. Once the word travelled into Uncle Vernon's ears Harry knew it was too late to backtrack, he had set his fate.

“-you stop. Completely. No more sex. No kissing. No beating. None of it. You _stop_. Never again. Never. Never.”

His uncle seemed torn, the sadist battling against the lovesick infected part. Harry waited patiently, perfectly prepared to follow through with death in case it all didn't pan out. The older man tilted his head to the side, and then answered firmly,

“Okay. Okay, just _stop_ , okay?”

Harry let the notorious knife clatter to the ground. It felt as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He was a free man, it seemed. His uncle embraced him, hugged him tight. Harry felt so unsettled that he almost puked.

Nice Vernon was _weird as fuck_.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, _agreed_.

-o-

Of course, it wasn't to last.

For a few weeks it seemed as if this perfect reality could exist. Harry almost convinced himself that life could be okay, that he could recover from his many years at Uncle Vernon's beck and call. The man kept a respectable distance from him, would not speak to him or slam him against walls or shove his tongue in his mouth. Progress was grand, the cupboard was still small but it felt as if Harry had gained precious unmistakable immortalised ground in this war of theirs. Dudley noticed his shift in mood, the steady rise of joy. The news of Mr. and Mrs. Green's sentences in prison being finalised was also a blessing. It felt as if everything was panning out just fine. Sure, Harry had a long rugged scar on his arm, but it was nothing long sleeves couldn't hide. Even the ghoul began to settle slightly as Harry began to trust the world.

But then, as was always destined, Aunt Petunia left for a discussion on _Touching The Void_ by Joe Simpson, and Dudley fell into a restful sleep. He would not be woken even by an earthquake. Harry and Uncle Vernon were left alone on the couch that had started it all. They watched the shifting images of the TV in utter silence, a tension rising in the air that was palpable to everything in sight, and Harry felt terror coming on. His uncle placed a hand on his thigh, and he knew his fate was sealed.

At least, thenceforth, he allowed Harry to slip out of reality. A bargain was struck anew; no suicide for no reality. It seemed fair, and what options did Harry truly possess? It was better than nothing.

Sunday Evenings reasserted themselves in his life, but it was bearable and nothing new. He had never expected it to truly last. The ghoul came back heavy, hard and scornful, but at least he had a friend, someone who understood him.

That night as Harry stared at the dark plain of ceiling in his cupboard, body not used to sex after such a long period of abstinence and aching terribly, he heard the clinking of Aunt Petunia's wine bottles as she shakily poured a glass. It seemed even if he hadn't deluded himself of the permanency of the change _someone_ had. He almost felt sorry for her; he now knew what it was like to fake pleasure for his uncle. He guessed that made him and his aunt soul sisters of a sort. He wondered if she would slap him if he said that or if she would break down in tears.

_Probably go for the wine_ he guessed as he came across the empty bottle that morning and threw it in the trash. _I hope alcoholism doesn't run in the family_ he redundantly wished. Perhaps if he ever escaped this place and the _powers that be_ released him from this weirdly immoral penance he could _not_ be an alcoholic. _Who knows, maybe everything will turn out okay?_ Harry almost died laughing.

-o-

Harry took down the last phrases of his studious notes, sheltered in his usual spot in the library. After his brief breakdown, he had returned to an ardent ambition for educational prowess, using words like missiles in his deciphering of what the subject English was actually about. _This is so nonsensical_ he thought as he attempted to decode another set of redundant language features. _Does anyone actually feel anything when they read? I certainly don't feel tension when the syntax changes!_ He flung his pencil onto his book, and huffed. It felt good to have a childish tantrum, if only for a few moments, there was seldom time where it was safe to relax enough to do so.

Harry shut his extracurricular English book, and fished out Maths. _One that actually makes sense_ he vindictively thought to himself. He liked to taunt English whilst favouring Maths. He caressed the cover of the book, doodles on the cover a product of his forays into Art, and mentally whispered _you'll always be my favourite Maths_. He opened the book, flicking to his latest page, and tongued his own mouth whilst deciphering basic factorisation. Maths progressed quickly when he was his own mediator; as in he tended not to mediate anything and just barged through full steam ahead.

_I multiply the 'x' to both inside the brackets._ He scribbled out the answer, tilting his head for a few moments, before checking the answers at the back of the book. This was his ultimate time of peace; undisturbed and free to peruse academia. Harry could simply exist here, in reality, yet not expected to act a certain way. There was simplicity in knowledge outside of himself, it was a convenient escape when the drift was having a day off.

He imagined that the ghoul would say something about products of his mind forming a union, but of course it didn't. The ghoul had no sense of humour.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul.

Harry snorted into the book. The ghoul truly was his best friend. And, no matter how pathetic that statement was, it was also very comforting.

He got back to work. He needed to redistribute his marks after all; that meant he needed to be better than _everyone_. Harry needed to finely calculate grades. And, if this gave him an excuse to not go on a raid with Dudley's mottled crew, then all the better.

-o-

His school books, filled with little to no notes, were in a state of despair compared to his extracurricular books. Harry, to continue the pretence of a dullard, scarcely wrote in them, mostly detailing lessons learned upon entry to the library or upon meeting with his books on his bed. It was costly of his time, to write down all learned in one day, but once the habit had been built had served him well. However, that was not the point, rather that to the outside eye his books were a perfect reflection of his current grade of D. If not for the discrepancy of his methodology of answering exams, it was a seamless scheme.

Shame that the test indiscretions could not be overlooked, and his past careless actions had brought Mr. Veneer knocking on his metaphorical door. He seemed more austere than he used to, clearly hardened by years among callow youths and rampant mongrels. His silver goatee shone in the flickering luminescence of school lighting; he was a veritable show stopper of an eccentric teacher. His gelled back hair was surely rock hard.

Harry had the urge to touch his marvellous hair, but didn't dare, _don't want to start another illicit paedophilia-based relationship_. One can never be too careful in that regard, anyone could be out to get you. Even other children. Especially other children.

Harry thought of Dudley's boys and their perusal of Delphine's photos. Dudley had eventually confiscated the photos, but the damage had already been done. One can't erase memories, after all.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, who had been oddly silent the past few days. Harry supposed it was near the centre of the week, what reason did the ghoul have to say anything? The ghoul only truly spoke on Sundays and Mondays nowadays.

His old teacher sat down across from Harry. In front of the student were his school books, misleadingly empty. Harry usually didn't bring them to any library as they were essentially useless, but he had predicted a meeting with Mr. Veneer for quite some time. He was almost shocked it had taken this long.

_Who knows, maybe he knew about all the drama from earlier_ Harry snickered at the thought of Mr. Veneer tapping his foot impatiently, waiting, whilst Uncle Vernon lovingly made out with Harry's neck whilst he lay there lifelessly.

_Stay here_ said the ghoul as Harry began to step out into the drift. He rocketed back to Earth just as Mr. Veneer righted his tie and stared at him contemplatively.

Mr. Veneer placed hands gently on the table, folded. He began,

“Hello Mr. Potter, I haven't seen you for a while.”

Harry smiled charmingly, having perfected the gesture after many nights staring into his hand mirror and looking constipated,

“Why, yes it appears so, sir, how time flies.”  
  


He had to admit, he sounded a bit airy and idiotic, but he supposed that was what he had been aiming for. So, mission success! It only felt strange because Harry had grown out of the habit of being a suck up. Numerous sex jokes to do with “sucking up” mysteriously popped into his head. The ghoul silenced them much to Harry's relief. His minds propensity for dirty jokes had amped up ten degrees since Uncle Vernon's obsession with “Harry in reality” sexual interactions.

“Hm.”

Said Mr. Veneer, peering at him ominously. Harry stifled a giggle, trying to remain serious as was expected, but it felt as if a wearied old goat were trying to dictate how he should be eating grass. Mr. Veneer was just a harmless old soul who gave Harry no concern; he was unafraid, perhaps being intrepid considering his history with adults alone.

“I think you know why I'm here, Mr. Potter.”

Mr. Veneer sounded very stern and disappointed. Harry watched him owlishly. This was a little bit of a novelty, adults were rarely so restrained with him. At home, there was no such emotion as disappointed, there was Aunt Petunia and Dudley's varying levels of affection, then there was Aunt Petunia throwing frying pans at his head in a drunken sobbing mess or Uncle Vernon screaming him into a corner or ripping off his clothes or even Dudley throwing the remote at his skull in a prepubescent rage-quit, although the latter was a lot less commonplace with his latest status as “best friend.” Disappointed, it was a foreign concept, it was too passive for the extreme emotions of the Dursleys. Harry, of course, had experienced disappointment before, but that was because his whole being consisted of passivity; for instance he had been _disappointed_ when Uncle Vernon had reinstated the Sunday Evenings, not sad or angry. Only disappointed.

“Oh.”

Harry let out the appropriate sound of interest, watched the teacher across from him with veiled apathy. _Sure, I'm super concerned about my grades professor, its my top priority, really_ Harry sarcastically thought as Mr. Veneer began to rattle on as the elderly tended to do,

“Well, Mr. Potter, I have slowly but surely observed the decline of your academics. 'D's is the current grade, I believe. So, it was 'B's to evade suspicion, it was 'C's after Mr. Reginald's untimely... demise, and now its 'D's... why? Is it your acquaintance with your cousin, who I have observed to be not of the better company, or is it something else? Whatever it is, Mr. Potter, it is no excuse for throwing away your future. A good future begins in childhood, in these grades now. And, yes, you have some raw talent, but if you smother it then it will disappear. The brain is like a muscle, letting it atrophy will only lead to loss, to lost opportunities and to regrets down the road. Currently, its not too late. If you take some tutoring with me, I can get your grades back up to muster, all you need is parental consent and we'll be good to go.”

Harry stared at Mr. Veneer bleakly, the enthusiasm coming off the old teacher in waves was slightly nauseating. The mention of Jeff had been like a stab in the gut, Mr. Reginald, as he hadn't heard anyone mention him whatsoever in many months, but the insinuations that Harry was just _letting_ all his brainpower go to waste truly struck a nerve. Hadn't he picked it up again? Hadn't he started his extracurricular learning? Sure, okay, perhaps it wasn't strictly fair to expect Mr. Veneer to know about his clandestine studies or his actual personality since he neatly hid both, but it still struck a chord. A realisation of sorts finally reached him;This was who he was to the outer world, they had no inkling as to his actual personality, they would never truly know him. Apart from the ghoul, he was completely alone and always would be. His isolation struck him hard in the solar plexus, and he took a few moments to right his mind from its emotional tremors.

“I appreciate the offer, Mr. Veneer. I do.”

Mr. Veneer's face, sallow, waxen as it was, seemed to age many years in that moment. He could hear Harry's dismissal of his opportunity; he felt Harry's act of surrender, of giving in to the ravenous jaws of apathy.

“Mr. Potter, although it is up to you, _I_ do _truly_ endorse this option. It really isn't too late. I understand in the past you have confided in me your guardians' lack of interest or belief in your studies, but as a teacher I believe I think I could sway them, if you let me try, if you trust in me.”

He looked so beseeching in that moment that it was almost painful. Harry stared for a long time, knowing it was pointless either way. Firstly, since he didn't actually lack any academic ability. Secondly, because if he discovered his family's treatment of Harry he would either be killed if he was outspoken or would be threatened into silence like so many of those hospital and police workers who the _powers that be_ had corrupted. It was futile, but a cruel part of Harry almost wanted Mr. Veneer dead.

He nodded his head, watched inanimately as Mr. Veneer's face lit up like a Christmas tree, wondering if this would be adding to Harry's body count of zero. He wondered if Jeff was part of his body count. Did he include his best friend?

_No, Harry_ said the ghoul.

But, it was a ghoul, why should he trust it?

-o-

Mr. Veneer, of course, went through all the regular teacher motions. Harry followed him to his office and watched as he collected up the important papers; the permission notes. It was all regulation now. _Wouldn't want any weirdos kidnapping and molesting students in the guise of tutoring_ Harry laughed to himself (internally of course, he had an image of not-entirely-crazy to maintain and laughing at nothing was surely a one-way ticket to a new label of psycho), as if Uncle Vernon would care in such a case. Or, for that matter Aunt Petunia.

Mr. Veneer didn't allow Harry to ride to his house in his car. He said it would be improper. For some reason that made a sharp coil of ice blister inside Harry's chest. He suddenly didn't want Mr. Veneer to die, he was just so proper it would burn so badly if he did. Harry walked home, but it wasn't bitterly. He was glad someone wanted to follow the rules for once, _who needs vehicular transport?_ and prayed that perhaps Mr. Veneer may be immune to death.

_Or is that just silly hope?_ Harry thought as he arrived back.

He observed, curious, from behind a well pruned bush as Mr. Veneer engaged in a shouting match with Aunt Petunia. Dear sweet Auntie Petunia. It went along the lines of;

“That boy? No! Dudley, my son Dudley, _he_ is the one with the potential, not the _boy_. That boy, that _freak_ , is good for nothing, just like his parents, you'd get nothing from him. If he tells you otherwise he's _lying_! Its all he ever does, lie, lie, lie...”

“Mrs. Dursley that is one of the most horrendous things I have ever heard in my entire life. You are a horrible spiteful woman and I hope you burn in the hottest of hells once God smites you down like you deserve! This is an injustice, that such a smart boy could live with such a wench, why, I wouldn't be surprised if _your_ verbal abuse has caused this lag in studies. Good day, and good riddance.”

Harry peered, feeling a little like a peeping Tom, at Mr. Veneer's return to his car. His chest was all puffed out, his face righteously angry, all red and splotchy. His anger much less resembled repressed sexual tension like Uncle Vernon, or unhinged jealousy like his aunt, but instead took on its own form as “servant of justice”. He wondered, strolling calmly back to the hot pot of his house, if Mr. Veneer's morals would remain in tact come tomorrow. Would the _powers that be_ convince him that a little boy's academic record was not as important as Mr. Veneer thought? Or, perhaps, would Harry be attending Mr. Veneer's funeral next week?

_He's an old fart anyway, a scourge on society's young and useful_ consoled the ghoul in that odd way of its. Somehow it always helped soothe Harry's soul a little.

The ghoul was apparently a follower of Herbert Spencer, a reactionary to Charles Darwin that Harry had recently read about, who spoke of how evolution revolved around “survival of the fittest.” If the ghoul had its way nursing homes would be abolished, certainly.

Harry stepped up to the plate of the welcome mat. He knew his aunt would be all revved up and volcanic rage from her argument with Mr. Veneer. Harry knew he would take the brunt.

_No frying pan at least, since your installation of the new organisation system_ said the ghoul. Harry cracked a smile, contemplating how breezy life had been lately as his Aunt Petunia spotted him and began to advance threateningly. She screeched,

“ _Boy_ , who do you think you are, saying such things of itty bitty Dudders? Who do you think you are, you ignorant fool, you idiotic incompetent _slut_!”

She stopped dead, apparently realising too late what she had said. Harry stared at her, long and hard, wanting her to feel very judged. He stepped forward, not truly distraught but needing to appear so if he wished to gain leverage over her, to shift their dynamic for his future. _Mr. Veneer said to consider my future, after all_ he sardonically thought. Harry played up the tone of betrayal, as if he had ever actually cared for his “auntie”,

“You _knew_.”

Aunt Petunia was shaking her head desperately like Sam the Chameleon, fervently denying such obvious truths. Harry pinched his leg ruthlessly, willing tears to form in his eyes. To his relief it didn't take long, and soon rivers of tears rolled down his cheeks without mercy,

“All this time, you _knew_ , you _knew_ exactly what he was doing to me and you did _nothing!_ ”

The accusation was rife in his voice, the perfect mix of disbelief and tragedy. _At this rate_ , Harry snickered mentally as tears were reciprocated on his aunt's cheeks, _I'd best join a drama class._

_Well_ , he conceded as she shakily reached for some of her hidden stash of wine behind the sofa, _she is technically already a mess, so its not exactly a challenge_. There was a sickening thought that he wanted to cause others to cry, just to see if he could.

He felt the ghoul's approval in his heart. Its steady mantra of _hurt or be hurt_ thrummed pervasively in this moment of destruction.

“N-no, I, of course not sweetie, I, I'd n-never, _no_.”

She hiccuped as he scrabbled against the cork of the bottle, eventually tugging at it with her teeth. Aunt Petunia collapsed down against the couch, whispering muddled and clearly pained. Harry continued on, harshly, not sure if it was overkill before assuring himself that normally someone in his situation would feel a lot of betrayal. He screeched, thinking even if it wasn't believable his aunt was too unravelled to notice either way,

“How _could_ you? I t-thought you loved me, I t-though we would be a _family_ one day, you and m-me and Dudley! I t-thought one day you'd b-be my _mother_. I... but t-that was never _true_ , was it? Because you saw what he was doing to m-me and you didn't _care_!”

Aunt Petunia had finally uncorked the bottle, and shakily spilled the red liquid all over her floral dress of lilies. It painted her, funnily enough, in blood stains. She shook her head as she took a swig from the bottle, blubbering pitifully,

“I-” hic “ _knew_ but I didn't-” hic “think he w-would t-take it _so_ -” hic “ _far_... I t-thought-” hic hic “that he w-would _stop_. H-he _stopped_ for a while, I t-thought it was over. A-and if I... if I w-went to _someone_ ab-about it, then _I_ would g-get jailed. I-” hic “have _Dudley_ t-to care for” hic “a-and I... I _love_ h-him...”

While she stared down into her lap, clinging despairingly to her green wine bottle, Harry gave her a scornful look before schooling his face. He let the tears remain for dramatic effect, but wasn't entirely sure how to use this newly found “treachery” angle for leverage. He could always make explicit demands, like he had with Uncle Vernon, but that just hadn't _worked_ , not properly at least.

He charged forward, deciding now to go the rage route. He let some burn in his chest like an inferno and tugged the bottle out of her hand roughly; ignoring the red wine spilt over his clothes. Harry cleared his throat and was about to yell himself hoarse when a sound at the door caused them to both freeze.

“ _No_...”

His aunt whispered as her husband's easily recognisable gait thumped down the hall. Harry began to hyperventilate as panic set in, he didn't want a beating. He raced over and shoved the wine bottle behind the couch. He fell forward just as Uncle Vernon entered the room to their tableau; Aunt Petunia slumped against the couch with tears on her cheeks and what looked like blood stains on her dress, Harry strewn across the floor also covered in blood and tears. He dropped his suitcase like it was a hot potato and rushed forward, slamming his knees against the floor as he turned Harry over, staring at his face and whispering miserably,

“Y-you _promised_ you wouldn't...”

He attempted to open up Harry's shirt, in his mind to check for cuts, but was intercepted by Aunt Petunia's grip on his collar. She had a look of cold fire in her eyes, unmistakable yet surprising. For the past few years she had appeared so defeated and deferential. Aunt Petunia stood between Uncle Vernon and Harry on the floor, her hand a flat palm on his chest. She stared him right in the eyes and said sternly,

“ _No_ Vernon, you will _not_ hurt this child. Never again.”

Uncle Vernon blinked, clearly dismayed that his wife knew about his affair with their nephew, before such bafflement was underscored by instinctive rage. His nephew who he incidentally had fallen in love with was lying there, prone, covered in what he believed to be _blood_ and this woman had suddenly brought this up. Uncle Vernon did something he had sworn he would never do to his wife; he struck her square across the face.

Aunt Petunia gasped, falling to the floor listless, despondent. She was clearly no match for a rageful Uncle Vernon, she couldn't protect anyone, she felt useless. Harry watched with what might have been amusement before he was suddenly crowded by hot hands opening his shirt. He turned his head away, not bearing to watch, not believing his uncle could have possessed such audacity to rape his nephew in front of his wife as a show of dominance, but found his skull tilted back. His eyes met the concerned brown of his uncle, who desperately asked,

“Where? Tell me _where_ you silly child!”

Harry blinked, utterly confused at what had occurred here today, and decided a wild guess was better than a non answer,

“Behind the couch.”

Now Uncle Vernon was perplexed, and sat back on his heels, his head a daze. Was Harry saying he had done the cut behind the couch? Or that something was behind the couch that had caused this? And, why did the room smell so thickly of spilt wine? He creaked as he stood up, and wobbled his way over to the floral pattern of the couch. Now that he came face to face with it there _were_ red stains on the floral print, but why on earth would Harry decide to slip behind the couch to enact his attempt?

He peered behind the upholstery and came across long rows of wine bottles, some empty, some full, some in between the two states. Uncle Vernon lifted one high into the air and stared at its label, G _rand Vin de Bordeaux 1987_ , the red liquid sloshing in its confines. Harry remained on the ground, staring at the ceiling as the oddness which had been that afternoon washed over him.

Uncle Vernon finally asked, realisation dawning if slightly delayed,

“Its not blood at all, is it? Its wine. All of its wine.”

Harry gazed down at himself and recognised what the scene must have appeared to be; the “blood”, lying still, his past actions. He withheld a hearty laugh, knowing such may prompt dangerous rage, and let his head thud back to the ground. _How brilliant_ he thought as Uncle Vernon tried to comfort an unruly, unforgiving and terrified Aunt Petunia, _I may have managed to split up their marriage. About time._

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, uninterested.

_I hope he doesn't try to marry me next_ Harry thought, imagining Uncle Vernon down on one knee in an overflowing suit with tears in his eyes, he wondered how he would react. Perhaps Harry would just scream and flee. In the inevitable case of a wedding he wondered if the _powers that be_ would show up, and sneeze into a hankerchief. Perhaps this was what this was all about. Maybe Uncle Vernon was his soulmate. _How disgusting_ , Harry desperately hoped otherwise.

_Agreed_ said the ghoul, _still_ uninterested.

One of these days Harry would find something to interest the ghoul.

_Doubtful_ said the ghoul, persistently _purposefully_ uninterested. Harry laughed in his head again, side-eyeing Uncle Vernon's calm caresses and their effects on the distraught Aunt Petunia. _Damn_ he thought of his aunt's weakness and susceptibility _they're not getting divorced, are they?_

### Chapter Three.

Harry, for some inexplicable reason, slept brilliantly that night. As soon as his head hit his mouldy pillow he felt himself slip into beloved unconsciousness. One may expect that as yesterday had been the climax of his life up until this point – his aunt admitting to her knowledge, his uncle demonstrating his loyalties by worrying over Harry and assaulting his wife – that he would be a nervous anxious animal, jittery with a stomach flooded full of butterflies. But, this was not the case. Harry was glad for the honesty, for the veil to have been pulled away. At least now there was a certain degree of control he possessed, an ability to predict what may occur; his aunt would either accept this new situation or she wouldn't. She would either protect Harry or she would throw him to the wolves. Harry had been freed from limbo, and was ecstatic for it; peaceful enough for a good night's rest.

The following morning was an awkward affair. Harry felt like breaking down into maniacal laugher at the stilted atmosphere surrounding the breakfast table. They were all walking on egg shells. He dealt out eggs and bacon, boiled and scrambled for those who liked each specific type, eyeing Uncle Vernon as he loitered at the head of the table. His uncle, who had once struck massive amounts of fear into Harry's heart, seemed innocuous now. Harry had clearly been _vaccinated_ enough times that he could disregard him ( _get it ghoul, because rape is funny_ Harry sniggered in his mind, past the point of giving a fuck for personal integrity). He and his uncle finally existed on a level playing field; his uncle held superior strength yet Harry clutched his heart. It was a battle of wits, of love and apathy, neither knew who would win out in the end.

Neither dared speak, for fear of giving impetus to some cataclysmic chain of events. Even a breath would tumble down this house of cards they had painstakingly built. They both knew that their lives hung in the balance of Aunt Petunia. As frail as she seemed with a monster of a bruise across her cheek and can't-stop-shaking hands, she truly did hold all the cards. She could kill them all if she liked, rat them out to the feds, defame Harry’s name by spreading the truth of her husband and nephew’s affair. Harry had certainly not expected this turn of events, he wished he had planned ahead and had more security, but sometimes you just need to roll with the punches.

Of course, no one had accounted for the other tenant of the Dursley residence, believing him to be pacified by stupidity and gaming consoles. Dudley stared, surprisingly aware and present, and inquired to his mother with caution colouring his tone,

“Mum, what... happened to your face?”

Uncle Vernon's chair squeaked as he lifted his fat arse from the table. Harry smiled at him as he waddled off and his uncle did a double take, as if asking _why are you smiling at me? What are you planning, hell child?_ It was a nice revival of their original relationship. Harry felt nostalgic. The ghoul plotted in his skull, thrumming like a ticking time bomb, _keep vigilant, you may escape unscathed yet_. The dining room door shut behind his uncle as he abandoned breakfast. _You've barely touched your eggs, dear uncle_ Harry jeered scathingly.

Aunt Petunia gave Dudley a long measured glance, as if weighing him in her hands. She nibbled on a piece of bacon, crispy just as she preferred it to be, and her eyes flickered towards Harry. Her nephew stood inconspicuously in the doorway, sans a plate, empty handed, his eyes down near his sides. It was blaring that he had no breakfast. Aunt Petunia offered him no food, and returned her gaze to Dudley, pretending Harry did not exist. _Good_ Harry thought to himself, ignoring the bitterness that kindled in his heart at the action _I don't want to exist either, you dirty old hag!_

The ghoul placated _calm, Harry, wait until the time is right_.

“I fell into the door yesterday, my little Dudders. Your darling father was kind enough to ice it for me with some peas from the fridge... he's a darling...”

Dudley made a throwing up gesture in Harry's direction. His face furrowed into a knot when Harry did not reply in any way whatsoever. His cousin simply stood there, floating, in the doorway, as if he was impeding on a family moment, as if he was nothing but a balloon hovering on a string. All hot air, no sauce. Dudley's own gaze stared at his father's vacancy, and then to his mother's mooning. He decided something in that moment which Harry would never glean, it was a secret choice, but it seemed important somehow. Dudley rarely made secret decisions, he normally crowed from the rooftops.

Aunt Petunia hadn’t noticed. Harry felt a bout of humour over the fact that he knew her son better than she did. _Point to me, bitter wench_ he snarled.

“Boy, clean the plates.”

His aunt instructed as she evacuated the room. Harry heard her loud echoing footsteps as she ascended the stairs. She had not called him “boy” in a long time, he had almost forgotten her tone could hold such a devious insult; devious because “boy” in and of itself held no negatives, it was simply the way she abused and tormented the word with her inflection that did so. He could feel her hatred radiate through her cusp of “boy” in her mouth. It slashed down his cheek, _boy_. He stepped forward gingerly, unsure of his latest moves, and gathered the plates into his arms. Dudley stayed seated at the table, and regarded his best friend,

“It wasn't a door, was it?”

Dudley's newest observational ability proved dangerous for Harry's schemes. Alas, to not answer would be just as incriminating as an affirmative. Yet, Harry still whistled as he packed away the plates. He owed his uncle nothing, leave it up to the man to clean up his own messes.

“It's about you, isn't it? It's all about you. I don't know how, but Mum has never been that cold to you, not even when Dad was getting too... strict... What did you do?”

The accusation in his cousin's voice made his body flood with cold, he knew it was serious because his words were said properly and without excess apostrophes. Harry twisted around, caught up in these webs of his own making, and cradled the cutlery in his hands, rolling the metal utensils together as his eyes worked their magic. He could imagine himself telling Dudley the truth. He could see the horror on his cousin's face. It would be a new development; the horror. It was the type of realisation that came with age, of knowing the world. Dudley had decided, rather recently, that he _had_ morals after all. His _own_ morals, not just those inherited from his lineage. Hearing about his father's transgressions would no doubt split him in two, wet his eyes and red his cheeks. Who knows? Maybe he wouldn't believe Harry at first. Maybe he would sit and fling accusations and let his rage flow. But, Harry knew Dudley. He was Dudley's best friend, like it or not, and he _knew_ his cousin was not the imbecile he often projected to the world. Dudley Dursley was a boy prone to sudden strokes of wisdom, as rare as they may be, and _had_ gained from hanging around with his elders as they smoked drugs and philosophised about morality. He had learnt concepts such as respect and boundaries, because those were important in the criminal world.

However, as easy as it would be to rattle off truths, Harry couldn't stomach it. There was the ghoul in his head warning him, sitting perched on his shoulder, ever perceptive and baleful, watching for any signs of attack. Telling Dudley? It didn't line up. It wouldn't work out. Dudley would tell his aunt or his uncle or the outside world, the boy couldn't keep a secret to save his life. With his aunt she would do nothing, would remain inactive. With his uncle, well, Uncle Vernon was not known for being well tempered. He was an irascible man, who would no doubt dole out his rage unto Harry. The outside world was, yet again, an impossibility. Would Dudley be killed off, like Jeff, or _made_ to forget? It wasn't a question of _if_ , it was a question of _which_.

Maybe it would be better if Dudley was dead. He never did seem to align in this love triangle of Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia and Harry. He was a loose end. An unhooked bolt. Where did he belong in this story of theirs?

Harry hummed non-committally as Dudley stared astonished. He couldn't quite believe that his best friend would ignore him in this manner. Harry could see the steam pulsing from his cousin's ears, feel the palpable rage thrumming under the floorboards.

“They're _my_ parents! Tell me what is going on this _instant_.”

He heard traces of his father in Dudley's voice. It was a bad sign. _Good job_ said the ghoul _for not trusting him with the knowledge_. Dudley had failed this unnamed test with his expectancy, with his narcissism, with the rage that felt like the snapping of belts on pale creamy skin.

Harry wiped down the table with a wet blue striped flannel. Dudley blinked the tears from his eyes, no doubt thinking something Vernon-like along the lines of _crying is for sissies_. Raw sadness exuded from his entire being. His hunched up posture, the roughness carried in his voice, all roads led back to despair and disappointment,

“I thought we were _friends_.”

It was a plea this time. Harry was beginning to suspect that Dudley may just be entirely clueless in this whole ordeal, but there was a rotten acidic part of himself that still blamed the other boy for Sunday Evenings. For his inactivity. For just standing by. Even if Dudley _hadn't_ known, the ghoul still held him accountable.

He didn't even bother looking at his cousin. Instead he exited the room, as silent as the grave, his footsteps never letting out even the slightest whisper of sound. Harry returned to his cupboard, not ashamed of the way he curled in on himself and cupped hands over his ears to block out the world. Dust rained down on his face, and he knew it was borne of Dudley's spite, his injured pride, his betrayal. His cousin stomped up the stairs, heartbroken, longing to ensure Harry's pain.

_So much betrayal in this house_ Harry laughed to himself _Uncle Vernon to Auntie Petunia, and now me to Dudders. What next, Aunt Marge to poor bloodthirsty Ripper?_

-o-

He met Sam Green in a grocery store on Fifth Street. The bell had been rung out, and old quacks favoured the store for its peace and quiet. Harry liked to shop there because no one asked him tricky unanswerable questions. Some questions, he had learned, didn’t _have_ answers. Or, if they _did_ have answers, you weren’t _meant_ to answer them, you needed to pretend that the answers had never existed in the first place. The ghoul agreed with him, staring with its unreadable eyes at a flustered Sam Green.

_Pathetic_ Harry thought, as Sam flinched at his disparaging glance. He noted the halo of bruising across his neck, reaching out from his shirt like a cowed dog’s paw attempting to reach the light. Foster care didn’t seem to be treating him well. Or maybe it had been Delphine, she’d always seemed like a loose cannon to him. He’d always been able to read her. Her mentality was simpler than the average Joe’s.

_Great minds think alike_.

Delphine came out from the sudden brilliance of the milk aisle. They sold all sorts here, almond milk, soy milk, 2% milk, milk that was just diluted juice. Harry had always been more of an any milk he can scavenge type of person but he liked the decadence of this store, it felt as if whenever he stepped inside a world of possibilities opened up. He was a king amongst kings when he glided down a red carpeted milk aisle, holding the capacity to buy any milk he liked, the freedom to affect the outcomes of his life left him hazy with drunken delight.

Dudley only drank full cream. Aunt Petunia only had skim with her tea. Uncle Vernon drank his coffee black – no milk. He felt sorry for them sometimes, the stilted lives they lived. He hoped it wouldn’t rub off on him.

Her face lit up upon seeing him, and Sam grimaced. _I was right_ Harry thought as her brother flinched from her wandering hand. It rested on Sam Green’s shoulder, and the skittish boy jerked out of his skin. Delphine most definitely hurt her brother. The siblings made quite the spectacle, in an esoteric store itching with rough Surrey life, the gentle souls who usually frequented this place had never so much as hurt a fly let alone their family.

He didn’t care about Sam, not at all, so he remained tight lipped. He inspected his sister instead, letting his eyes rove her form. He knew what lay underneath now, he would always know. The moment with the polaroid was a fixed point, a snap-shot he would see in the few seconds before he died, eternally driven into his cranium, secreted away within the deepest cavity of his coding; there she lay, naked and ruined, a masterpiece of pain.

Delphine wasn’t limping. She strut. She sauntered. But, she did not limp or wince or hide such. She oozed psychotic confidence. She held no shame for injuring her brother. Harry could understand that, Sam was a twit. But, it was something deeper as well, a drumming war beat that spoke _hurt or be hurt_ in his mind, it was so easy to believe that the world was split into victims and abusers, that you had to _chose_. Her hair was well-washed and clothes well-picked. That was to say, picked to be as slutty as possible. Even if he had never glimpsed that polaroid he would still be able to see what lay beneath. She walked legally naked, just short of a public indecency charge.

Harry admired her, somehow, for her balls. Whenever he dressed he wanted as many clothes as he could pile on, only resisting excessiveness by the force of needing to appear normal. If he had a choice, he would walk in a full-body ensemble, head-to-toe apparel which shielded all but his eyes in two thin slits. Delphine wasn’t like that. Delphine wanted to stare being in the eye and dare them to touch her, to unravel her, to hurt her. She was saying _I’m a slut, what are you going to **do** about it?_ He understood that sometimes the greatest protection was none at all, was total exposure, utter irrevocable vulnerability. You could never get betrayed that way, because everyone was always going to hurt you anyway.

No friends. No enemies. It sounded peaceful.

That’s what mattered to him. That’s what he cared about. She was content, she was a raging fire, a vessel of malign destruction. Delphine had been set free, set loose upon the galaxy at large. Life had made her a bomb which would explode one day, she would impound gravity, suck in all from her orbit, a black hole personified. Harry wondered who she would take with her over the edge. He wanted to watch her burn, to see the fireworks across the sky. He’d never seen fireworks before, he’d lived a sheltered life, clearly.

The world was at rest.

He left Sam with her, walked out of that grocery store without a word, left the world none the wiser. Harry knew there would be no bruises on her thighs any longer. Hope flickered and fell to dusk in his chest, he smothered it before it could metastise. Just because it worked for Delphine didn’t mean it would work for Harry. Delphine bowed to no _powers that be_.

The ghoul was oddly silent. Harry didn’t blame it.

-o-

Harry guessed you could call this new _thing_ between him and his uncle camaraderie.

They were both in the dog house. The house matriarch had spotted them, had realised the truth, and had decided to stick her fingers in her ears and pretend it wasn’t happening. She blamed them both, Harry realised. She saw them both as perpetrators of this horrendous crime. She was judge, jury and executioner. Aunt Petunia had taken to staring holes in their sides, as if to say _I know_.

She knew.

All these years Harry had been a fool to think he’d been innocent in this crime. This adulterous affair. How could he? He was no child, not truly, not for a long time. He wasn’t powerless, he was no fool. So, why didn’t he put an end to it? Why did he passively accept it? Where was the line supposed to be drawn?

He guessed you could call this new _thing_ willingness. Somehow. It didn’t matter how much he fought, none of that mattered any longer. When his soul ceased rebelling that was as good as consent.

So, they were both to blame.

He and his uncle had meetings. Support meetings? He guessed you could call them that. They had a rendez-vous once every few days, and gathered their wits. Or, it was mostly Uncle Vernon talking, and Harry holding his breath and submerging himself in the non being.

For a partner in crime he lacked a necessary clarity of the situation. He had inklings. He was _pretty sure_ that his pseudo-parents were having marital issues, intimacy problems. Harry thought there had been a distance in their marriage, a separation between the two, it might have been there even before the affair.

He called what he and his uncle did an “affair”, he wasn’t entirely sure why. He could fully accept his role in this, Harry supposed, if he called it an affair. An affair implied willingness. It _had_ to be willing now. Otherwise his aunt not doing anything was saying she cared more for reputation or her husband’s salvageable morality than Harry. It meant she was idly standing by and watching with her polaroid camera, clicking, clicking, and tutting her tongue half-heartedly.

That wasn’t allowed to be true, so, he and his uncle were both players in this game. That’s just how it _was_. And some questions weren’t answerable, so Harry kept tight lipped on the situation. It was just like always, keeping silent, keeping watch, being vigilant, relying on instincts and the ghoul. Nothing was different, so his heart didn’t have any reason to be hurting. Aunt Petunia had _never_ been a safety net, and he needed to _accept_ that and _move on_.

Just move on.

-o-

When he was younger he had counted each and every bruise, had taken note of their colour and shape, had connected pain to each characteristic, and had learnt the healing process off by heart. He kept a tally of the number in his head, repeating it like a mantra, like a white noise buzzer, whenever he felt the urge to tell anyone. It was self-prescribed electroshock therapy, he had said that number in a reminder of the pain, in a recollection of _consequence_. He had learnt not to say a word, had trained himself to hold it in, had memorised the colours of (day 1) pink and red to (day 2-6) blue and purple to (day 7) pale sickly green to (day 8-14) yellow. 

And now, _what_? Dudley wanted him to just tell him all about it. Out of the blue. We want the truth now. No warning. No build up. Just... _tell me what happened_.

“I fell into a _door_ Dudley, what do you _think_ happened?” Harry taunted sardonically, yet his words were soft spoken, pillowed out in the ingrained sense of quiet one learned when they _had_ to learn such. When safety was not a given, and quiet fostered a semblance of _okay_. His cousin _knew_ all too well what had happened. There was no point in _asking_. No one ever _asked_. They just _took and took and took and took and took andtookandtookandtoo-_

_Focus. Danger._ The ghoul said, but its words were not formed, rather were impressions, directives seared straight into Harry’s nerves, as if scolding coffee had been tipped down his brain stem and all his neurons were spitting at the exact same time, in perfect chaotic rampaging harmony.

His brain short circuited for a moment. White blanked his vision. His head swum, but he rocketed back to earth soon enough, right into the eyes of Dudley. He didn’t know what Dudley had just said. He was lost, staring right into the eye of the storm, with no rope around his waist to keep him from floating up into oblivion. He resisted the urge to flat out say “What?” because that would imply he hadn’t been _listening_ and _you always have to listen_.

So, Harry simply cocked his head, giving an absurse unidentifiable expression. It was cookie-cutter, custom build. Each to their own, Dudley could interpret his blank mirror of a face however he so chose to. His face would just reflect back what Dudley wished to see. They said that when you stared into a wild animal’s eyes, you saw only yourself, shining back in the broken shards of an iris’ hurricane. Harry exploited this, caught up in the wilderness of treacherous honesty.

The ghoul came to his rescue. _Say I don’t know what you’re talking about_.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Harry recited dutifully, sounding as if he was reading from a script and not shackled in the heat of the moment. He had no tonal direction from the ghoul’s stark loveless voice, only infinite oceans of nothing to fish in, so he had to try his best with improvisation. He wasn’t exactly feeling up for any major acting debut, he might have to call the agency and cancel his latest blockbuster.

Dudley gave him a scornful look, an askance glance that twisted Harry’s gut like a knife, “Are you _scared_?” He said the words as if they were the most disgusting thing to ever pass his lips.

Harry thought, in that moment, that Dudley was not so different from his father, after all. He was a mould, a block of blank soap to be carved out by Uncle Vernon’s butter knife brain. Dudley didn’t really exist as anything but a reflection of his parents, a simulation of Harry, an expectation of life.

Harry nodded, liking the way it took his cousin off balance. His cousin was afraid of fear, which was funny in and of itself, but also redundancy at its best. It was funny how he and his cousin had once been _actual_ friends, they had covertly shared popcorn whilst watching cartoons and hung around in the playground and Dudley had spilled insecurities that he wasn’t “cool”. The cousins had endured the Green Family drama together, the death of Jeff, and the estranged nature brimming on the horizon of Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon’s marriage.

But, in the end, Dudley was no different to his father. He was just a spoiled little brat wailing for Harry’s attention, _demanding_ to know what was going on, as if he had any right at all to _know_ what was _fucking going on_. Rage spiked, merciless and spurned, and Harry fell back and absorbed the feeling, the acute blow as his heart ratcheted up to notch eleven on the speedometer dial, it burned in his chest, but it _burned good_. He really wanted something to burn. He wanted _Dudley_ to burn for his entitlement, for his curiosity, for his narcissism.

His hands tingled, and he felt a wave of sensation swoop in his stomach, as if some grand call of the universe had been replied to. Harry returned his gaze to the ever angry Dudley, and blinked in puzzlement at the smoke coming off his hair in eddying spirals. He rubbed at his eyes, wondering if all his dehydration and prolonged starvation had finally caught up to him, wondering if he had caught his death. The picture remained the same, and Dudley was set so off balance by Harry’s diverted attention that he patted his head in confusion, recognising where his cousin’s eyes had led him.

Was Dudley... on _fire_?

The other boy didn’t seem to note the wisps of grey tunnelling off his scalp. He remained in shock at Harry’s admission, still caught up in his surrender to fear. Dudley could never understand such truthful vulnerability, so mixed up with his father’s voice in his ear, a devil hanging a la limpet off his shoulder. Boys don’t cry, Dudders. Boys aren’t scared, Dudders. Boys get angry and hit other boys but they’re never scared. Harry spied the thoughts racing through his head. Like mice sprinting on endless treadmills inside their cages, hamster wheels whirring like cogs in a machine. Dudley’s mind was on loop, he was a robot boy cast in a certain light. Harry liked to watch the sparks fly from his blank face, the smoke pooling up into the air and dissipating into nothing, as if it was a show just for Harry to enjoy, a presentation of the secret power he possessed in his very bones. Dudley would never need to know that Harry had made the smoke, that Harry had held his skull between the hard bones of his arms and squeezed just enough to make fire thunder.

Harry let out a breathless laugh, that same fire wild and roaring in his emerald eyes. He stepped forward, smooth and lunging like a panther’s gait. He felt long sharp canines elongating from his gums. He felt the wild animal within himself swim to the surface; ready to be free.

_Careful_ said the ghoul, always watching, always warning. Almost like a concerned parent. Always there, making judgement and intervening in danger, but never sharing the joke, face a blank slate of the daily monotony of adult life.

Harry let his humour fall away, tiles falling out from beneath him, exuberance dissolving in his hands, sand dripping through the slits in his cupped palms. He cocked his head, a predator on the prowl, and snarled to Dudley’s astonished countenance, “ _Scared_ huh?”

He saw his cousin swallow his own tongue. The once bully seemed to sense the danger of the situation. Even a buffoon could sniff out the electrifying threatening mood that wafted off of Harry’s skin like curls of smoke.

“Scared of what, Dudley. I’m not scared of anything. I think _you_ are scared, of the truth that is. I think you know _all too well_ what goes on under the roof of _precious uncle_. I think you know and I think you’re too _scared_ to say a damned thing. You’re oh so good at it, dear Dudders, just like your mother, that cowardly silence. Why stop now? Why ask questions? I think we both know what _goes on_. I think we both know who the _monster_ is that you’re so _scared_ of.”

Dudley flinched, his face carved out of solid marble. Harry thought that an earthquake would shatter him, right into a million pieces, right down to his stone cold heart. The rock pulsed in his chest, icy. He hoped Dudley felt every iota of pain, of guilt. He _deserved_ to feel it. He deserved agony. Always. Forever.

The boy inquired, voice suddenly gentle, as if all passion from the moment had been doused, “It’s... It’s like Delphine, isn’t it?”

_Danger_ said the ghoul.

Harry heeded the call, ducking his head down at Dudley’s question. He lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. The territory of danger had already been thoroughly pillaged, he needed some reprieve, some solace. Dudley remained silent as Harry turned around and walked off. All anger had been drained from the situation, sediments of uneasy realisation stained the air. His cousin never said a word, only stared with hooded eyes.

_He’s awfully good at staying silent_ Harry sneered to himself, roofed by the fiery earthen tones of Autumn above and sodden earth below. Nature layed its path, and Harry was helpless to do anything but follow.

-o-

Peculiarly, the next time he saw Mr. Veneer it played out in a way Harry hadn’t expected. He had, perhaps foolishly, presumed that his old teacher would either display signs of guilt, signs of being bought out, or signs of being dead – the corpse like pallor and casing of a coffin. Strangely enough, during their next short interaction, passing one another in the school hall as Harry made his way to his first class of the day, the grey goateed teacher simply blanked him, as if they had never met at all, as if Harry had imagined their whole dramatic interplay.

He drifted past, pretending the same, focusing on the breathing in his chest and not the crushing sensation of the world squeezing around him, ignoring the ring of blue that decorated his throat, the breathless choke-hold like a slip-knot around his neck. So tight.

_Breathe_ said the ghoul, apathetic as it always _fucking_ was, as if it could care less for the impending sense of doom that hung over Harry like a storm cloud.

He gritted his teeth, smiling through his stilted lilting gasps. He clawed at his own palms, most likely drawing blood, but too consumed by his own feeling of arresting plummeting terror that he didn’t feel the drips of incriminating red rolling down his palms. He breathed _in_ and _out_ and _in_ and _out_ in time with the ghoul’s words, following its monotone voice like a doctrine.

_In. Out. In. Out. In. Out._

His mind flickered backwards in time, as if all the clunking cogs in his machine had been forcibly jilted counter-clockwise, and the rolls of black film were becoming undone and unhooked, as if the buzzing grey static background were flashing in shades of the past.

Harry found himself trapped in his own morning. He recollected his aunt’s loud stiff voice drifting down the stairs like a ghost’s haunting chant, seeping under his skin and scratching into his spitting nerves. He saw himself, as if translucent, rising up the stairs. Aunt Petunia was situated in front of her large dresser mirror, adjusting her makeup and rings, tightening her necklace around her throat, gussying up her hair so it floated down her back in loose enticing curls. She was making pretty, she was making m-word, dressing up all fancy like a boulevardier to most likely captivate her wayward spouse’s attention. He watched his own timid presence make itself known in the room as his foot shuffled silently on the floor, drifting forward unattached to the world, no tether, no soul.

Aunt Petunia caught his eyes through the mirror, watching him stoically next to her own reflection. Staidly, stonily, her metallic eyes idly strolled down his figure, catching the newly formed bruises along his collarbone. She tapped the stool beside her with a finely manicured nail, and the _tack tack tack_ it made against lacquered wood was an omen of warning, as if to say _be careful where you step_.

Harry, hiding behind the door, shying away from the scene, watched through his trembling fingers as the younger version of himself, the Harry from that morning, perched himself on the edge of the stool. He was as still as stone, muscles unclenched in case his aunt deemed him more punching bag than boy that morning. Harry winced in sympathy for his previous self, unable to stare at his aunt’s expression in that grandiose and gratuitous mirror that exposed them both. A striped scarf hung over the edge of the reflective surface; it was Uncle Vernon’s. It had been a sticky warm that morning so he hadn’t needed it.

It remained there on the mirror, as a reminder.

Her gnarled and reaching nails found their way into the younger Harry’s hair, gently mussing the strands of raven. Her voice was tenderly venomous, like a slow acting poison romancing him to sweet serene slumber, “Poor little Harry Potter.”

The younger Harry was lulled by her movement, entranced by the affection. The Harry at the door, still peeking in at the scene like a transfixed voyeur, felt like scolding his younger self. He had been there that morning, he knew what it had felt like – that searing hope that this kindness was _real_. Yet such delusional wishfulness was no excuse for believing her again, for falling under her wicked sway like a naive child buying into fairy tales. He had thought he was better than that, he had thought he knew better than to fall for love again.

As expected, as he had _known_ would happen, it wasn’t _real_. Outside Harry watched unsympathetically, like the ghoul that pulsed in the younger Harry’s head. They all watched in sync as Aunt Petunia’s maternal stroking transformed into an unforgiving grip. She tugged at his hair punishingly, still painting her lips with the other hand, and said, “I _heard_ this morning.”

The younger Harry said nothing. He simply sat, accepting of the pain. Harry at the door cursed the wretched woman, wishing for all the world that he could step in and take his younger self away from that humiliating vulnerable moment. Yet, he was frozen, insensate, leant against the door doing jack shit.

Aunt Petunia’s eyes lit up like the fury of a forest fire, all burn, all destruction, no remorse. She was a force of nature, ready to whittle him into nothing but smoke and ash. “So _loud_ , downstairs, when you _both_ thought I was asleep. When you thought you could get away with it, you little _slut_. He’s _my_ husband, _mine_. I want you _away_ from him. I want you to stop with your freakishness, I want you to _stop_.” She was a harsh whisper, a grating nail on a chalk board, pressed against the stone boy’s ear, funnelling in a howling screeching wind.

Her iron grip on his hair loosened. A single outstretched finger moseyed its way down his neck, under the cusp of his chin, down down until it ringed his necklace of lapis. Harry, breathing in the forest fire like second hand smoke, was a captive audience at the door as her glistening red polished nail traced the outline of his uncle’s fingers. A reminder, a message, a statement of ownership.

“Clean this _up_. Now. We don’t want anyone to _see_ , do we?” She hissed, standing abruptly and yanking Harry up by the collar like a merciless lioness gripping her cub by the scruff of its neck, canines sinking into his throat, tooth indentations like bloody moons. Aunt Petunia swung him down into her own make up chair, her salon specialty. His whole body jerked, bones slamming together, as he made impact. Her arms still swung long after he had been redirected, as if mindlessly floating in zero gravity, searching for another target. The swing came all the way around, a revolution of the sun reaching its destination. Finally, as the music halted and time slowed, her hand thwacked against his closed lips. His mouth was rug to paddle the dust from, to clean and fix and remake however she envisioned it. She didn’t smile as he flinched, she had a face that spoke of justice, it said _this is the only way_. Harry remembered the taste of blood on his tongue, and within the memory, younger Harry would feel the spike of pain and flood of liquid pooling inside his mouth.

His aunt strutted towards the door, all high-class soullessness and unforgiving elegance. Her golden tinted tights made it seem as if she was an angel sauntering on honeyed clouds; better than thou. Harry flinched back from the memory-door, so immersed that he worried she would track him down even in memory form, and witnessed her pause at the room’s exit. The words, as etched as they were in his mind, fell from her lips with crystal clarity, “And that too, not that anyone would believe you either way.”

The younger Harry, dwarfed by the enormity of his aunt’s salon chair, gingerly reached for make up to patch up his latest marks. The bleeding lip would just be another to add to his collection, what did it matter that this time his _aunt_ had been the perpetrator? What did any of it matter, if the marks faded and no one ever knew? He was just on a revolving wheel, going through the same motions without an inch of changeability. Not manoeuvrable.

An elbow woke him from his reminiscence, and Harry stumbled forward unprepared for the sudden jolt. He opened his eyes and realised he was submerged in a roiling crowd of eleven year olds. He rubbed at his eyes, the voice of the ghoul in his head sounding distant, and wandered his way down towards class. Mr. Veneer hadn’t remembered him, hadn’t recognised him, as if Harry _was_ just a ghost, just a figment of nothingness. All of a sudden he was struck with an extreme case of fatigue. He was so tired of this, _all_ of this.

Half-living, Harry walked and walked and walked. Time malfunctioned, and in the blink of an eye he was already sitting in class, even though he was still meant to be standing in the hall way. A 2B pencil smugly told him there was a test of some kind. He blinked down at it, blurry eyes glittering in a honey comb effect of shifting tiles, he palate tasted papery as if he had scoffed cardboard. He wondered how long it had been. Words scattered with no care for order across the page. He huffed out a laugh as the letters made a run for the edge of the paper, splicing and dicing into dizzying combinations, he splattered a thumb down, rubbing over the dried printer ink.

_Focus_ said the ghoul.

Harry glanced up at the clock. Numbers on the board said there were forty minutes remaining. He hadn’t written a word.

_Begin_ the ghoul appeared to impersonate a teacher in that moment, encouraging Harry in his educational pursuits where no one else ever successfully had. He mentally smiled at the intangible creature residing in his brain. It felt more and more real as time continued, it was beginning to become something he could count on, a consistency.

His hand clasped around the pen and he thought of how much right he _should_ get. Time seemed distorted, as if someone was temporally challenged and had fucked everything up, seconds slid into hours and Harry was the solid rock, unmoving, in the centre of the hurricane. He felt the hard shell of the 2B. He brought the granite to this nose and sniffed deeply, before falling into breathless giggles.

_Focus_ reminded the ghoul, ever the mother hen. The words were emotionless and uncaring, but Harry thought the ghoul _must_ care, why else would it be here at all?

He thought he’d give himself a treat. A little surprise. Ds were all well and good and dandy and lovely _but_ maybe he could get a 70%, just this once, just one time. He rationalised that he would return to his normal educational standard right after this strange midday test. What would it hurt?

Harry flicked open the test paper, mind whirring yet functional. _Yes_ he thought resolutely _it will be a once in a lifetime reward_.

-o-

The playground swerved around him and Harry gripped a swirly brittle surface that may be cement as he made his way over to shade. His whole body was on fire, it felt like, and his fingers never stopped buzzing and tingling. It felt exactly the same as when he’d sorta maybe kinda set Dudley on fire, so of course Harry would resist the feeling whole-heartedly and simply swallow down the suffocating nausea.

“Harry?”

A voice was closing in. Maybe it was the ghoul? He couldn’t be certain. He couldn’t be certain of anything. The whole world was out of focus, as if someone had spun the camera lens enough to make it a merry go round.

“Harry, what’s up?”

It was familiar but he couldn’t help feeling like frowning for some reason. His head hurt, it kept thumping, and the whirling of noise in his fingertips rose to a crescendo. It felt like he was drowning in flashes of blinding light and a maelstrom of cacophonous sound, all forced down his throat and into his ears all at once.

“Hm’whap?” Harry asked, semi-coherently at the ghoul’s prodding _say ‘what’_.

A hand latched onto his arm and Harry flinched violently, jerking back and apologising before he remembered where he was, “Nonono m’sorry please nono-” He was only cut off when the ghoul shushed him with a stern _quiet, Harry._ Followed up with a rebuke of _say nothing._

“Hey, it... it’s ‘kay. It’s just me, Dudley.”

The voice became soothing, but Harry’s whole body filled with tension. Dudley. Dudley. The name tasted sour on his tongue. It was off eggs. Curdled milk. Burning rubber shoved right down into his cesspool of a stomach. _Say ‘hi Dudley’._

Blind and overwhelmed, Harry read from the ghoul’s kindly gifted script, “Hi Dudley.”

_Now what?_ He thought to the ghoul, forgetting that he wasn’t meant to talk to the voice in his head, not directly at least. But, he was swimming in confusion, and all the once easy-to-follow rules had become blurred and illegible.

_Now we wait._

“...Harry?” The voice – Dudley – continued.

_Yes Dudley?_

“Yes Dudley?”

“What’s up?” Dudley was persistent.

_Nothing is wrong._

“Nothing is wrong.”

“You sound... strange, ‘n b’fore you kept saying sorry ‘n stuff.” Dudley did make somewhat of a good case.

Ever the quick thinker, the ghoul came up with a solution _what do you care? We’re fighting, aren’t we?_

“What do you care? We’re fighting, aren’t we?”

“I... well, I _don’t_. Whatever.” Dudley defensively said, sounding annoyed. “You’re just acting _weird_.”

_Well, I don’t want any help_.

“Well, I don’t want any help.”

_Especially not from you._

“Especially not from you.”

“Ugh, whatever Harry, did your own _grave_ then,” his cousin said in that clipped voice of his. Harry, still blind, heard the rustling of leaves, and knew it meant Dudley was walking away, leaving him in peace.

_Thanks_ he said to the ghoul, but it didn’t reply.

_Alo-one aga-ain_ Harry sung to himself, lost in song and dance of his mental ballroom. He swum in pearls of sonnets, symphony and song twirling like infinite inevitable m-word in his veins. _Alo-one aga-ain_. Such sweet serene slumber. Thank you Auntie. Thank you uncle. _Alo-one aga-ain_. _Come ho-ome aga-ain. Alo-one aga-ain. Stone bo-one aga-ain._

-o-

“Say you love me.” The beast, at it again. “ _Say_ it. Now.”

He hoped he would choke on his tongue and die. “I...”

Relentless. Merciless. Painful. Callous. “Say it.” No room for mistakes.

“I... l-love you.” Never had he felt more see-through, more powerless.

-o-

_-silent and secret. Inside his mind was a whole other world, a better place, a safe place to retreat to when the bad unthinkable unreal not-really-happening things happened. It wasn’t denial, it was a shield, it was a necessity. He slid himself behind the roiling clouds, closing his eyes, shutting out the world and letting the fog choke him down into nothing but frissons of air. He was mist. He was air. He was phantom. That way, no one could touch him, it all just passed through, like fingers gracing a cloud’s cheek, nothing but air and tender flesh evaded. Him, in a bubble of security, impenetrable, secure and strongholded, there was something so peacefully beautiful about the sanctity of quiet that made a once cold part of him smooth out, furrowed brow to silken skin, irrepressibly simple tha-_

“...Mr. Potter, attention Mr. Potter, anybody home?” Mr. Veneer’s voice was like a breath of fresh air. Harry’s face, doused in an icy reminder to arouse from slumber. He blinked dazedly, tilting so as to face the man head on. His eyes flickered around, taking in the surrounding office; the principal’s office, decorated in bachelor’s diplomas and shiny medals concerning valour within the community, a real public serving saint, a real _hero_ among the people, all those shiny medals on display could mean nothing else. The seat beneath him held him unforgivingly, but Harry leant into the feeling. He felt as if he had awoken from a weeklong vacation, marooned in the middle of nowhere with only a lapping tide for company. He wasn’t sure of the day of the week – the consuming clouded feelings were a bit like time travel in that regard.

“Yes, sir, all engines firing at full capacity,” Harry smiled wryly, trying to play off his inattention as simply a ten (eleven?) year old being distracted.

Mr. Veneer winked in return, most certainly trying to set Harry at ease. Harry, uneasy in every nature of the word, forced his body to become lax and face pacified, and watched his stiffly sitting relatives out of the corner of his eye. Uncle Vernon looked five seconds away from blowing a fuse or popping an artery, and Aunt Petunia had her face so fakely squeezed into a polite smile that Harry worried for the structural safety of her lips; _please let them fall off so I can crack a joke and break the ice_. The ice, of course, referred to the professionally seated principal, donned in a suit three times the cost of his uncle’s pay check and five times more ostentatious and arrogant. If a tie could emote Harry would be betting this one was on a road for deadly flamboyancy. The man beneath the suit stared at their interaction as if watching a tennis match, he was the kind of man you would expect to obtain a job that required more popcorn chewing than child management.

“Hm,” said the principal, nameless and unimportant. Harry felt like punching the man in the face, what was he doing here in this interaction? It may be his office, okay fair point, but this was a showdown between truths and lies and slightly incestuous relatives and very much brainwashed fourth grade teachers. Principal NoName was an unrecognised variable, an uncontrollable factor, and Harry immediately despised him. _Get the fuck out of my boss battle_.

“So, as I was saying, Mr. Potter’s score on this national perspicacity aptitude test was quite unanticipated. He scored in the ninetieth percentile _at least_ for his age group, which is quite unheard of, especially considering his academic history. Let’s just say, in layman’s terms, a 70% in this test is equivalent to ninth grade level _already_.”

Harry was in a state of shock.

_What the fuck._

The panic that brimmed in his chest never reached the surface, even though with one look in his uncle’s eyes he knew he was a dead man walking. Tears burned hot and heavy in his chest, like the tight clamp of a hand in his hair twisting and twisting until hair uprooted. He controlled his breathing without any slight deviation from expectation.

_Breathe, breathe_ said the ghoul, still there, effortlessly working in the backseat of his brain.

Harry rued his unthinking past self. A 70%? What the _hell_ had he been _thinking_?

_Breathe, breathe_. The ghoul’s measured tone in his mind was an anchor which he fell upon heavily, breathing in time with its words. _It will be okay_ Harry assured himself, heart palpitating at the purely violent glance from his disappointed aunt, _I will **make** it be okay. That’s what I **do**. This is no **different**_.

Harry cleared his throat, drawing the attention of all patrons of the room. He shifted in his seat, scenarios and personas racing through his brain at the speed of light. The temperature in the room raised by five notches all at once, and his body felt aflame in the direct line of sight of four adults with varying degrees of fury. Yet, he persevered, breathing still sedate and steady, hands clenched in his lap under his perfectly ironed and cleaned school jumper, and prepared to salvage this situation from the shit show it was becoming, “Um.”

Mr. Veneer paused in his no doubt well thought out ramble. His aunt turned to him with an air of expectancy, the lift of her perfectly pickled brow – still trying to salvage her marriage most likely judging by the elegancy of said brow – signalling all Harry needed to know. He interpreted her message as _don’t fuck this up_.

“Yes Mr. Potter, what is it?” Asked the walking goatee.

“Um, the thing is, I... erm, may have...”

“ _Yes?_ ” The principal asked, speaking for the first time in this whole interaction.

Harry solidified, recalling an inner sturdiness hidden under layers of prepubescent weakness. He cleared his throat once more, grinding his teeth together for only a moment before he spat out his delicately chosen words, “I cheated on that test.”

He wanted to throw up.

His admission coated the room in a blanket of silence so thick even a butter knife could not cut through and reach bedrock. Uncle Vernon gave him a considering nod, as if Harry had passed some kind of unidentified test. Harry’s stomach growled, as if in disappointment, and he was hit by a sudden bout of nausea. He had gained his uncle’s _approval_. That was the most sickening thought he’d had in a long time, not that he’d been doing much thinking of late.

“Are you sure about that, Mr. Potter?” Inquired Mr. Veneer in a soft tone, as if prodding a rowdy lion.

Harry nodded, resolute, “I cheated on every answer of that test, every single answer.”

Aunt Petunia’s smile was particularly cruel, her blood-red lips curled up in such a way that Harry was heralded to be her next meal. She steepled hands in her lap, titling her head in a demure and simultaneously aggressive manner, “ _Well_ then boys, I think that settles that, doesn’t it?”

_-the fog swept him up and Harry exhaled a long plume of stress until his whole body was lax. The cloud, insinuating itself beneath him once more, fuzzed up his mind and he layed back so completely that his whole body was festooned in a thick bulge of bubbles. His toes tingled, and Harry let out a numb sigh, allowing the cold to seep into him, as if welcoming him to the night’s embrace. The strange sensation of homeliness returned twofold, his place in the world was all of a sudden definite and decided, it was nice for someone else to take care of it all, it was a certain decadence he never-_

“We have fun, don’t we?”

Harry blinked drowsily, still adjusting to his revival within the land of the living. He arched up slightly, joints clicking as if he had been stagnant for a long period of time, before he realised his state; utterly naked. Not an inch of skin covered. He toppled back down to earth, slamming against the downy cover of the masterbedroom bedspread as if it was the sound barrier and he was a lilting haunting note tearing through the fabric of the universe.

Curled up like a snake protecting vital organs, his slitted eyes took in the scene surrounding him. Uncle Vernon, of course, splayed back, lax, staring up at the ceiling, most likely in a post-coital glow. The room, stiff and orderly, no more mood lighting, only impersonal clinical detached decorations; Aunt Petunia’s doing. Her stuff was scattered all over, as if in a reminder that she _existed_ , that Uncle Vernon should _consider her_ ; dress hung up on a clothes hanger on the inside of the door; salon chair salient on the floor, taking up space like that was its sole purpose upon conception; rows of makeup on the dresser curtained by chains and necklaces alike; leaning towers of reaching books, to serve as a memento of Aunt Petunia lying back in bed and letting her eyes take in every page, to serve as a souvenir of her _existence_. His uncle’s scarf was not on the mirror any longer, instead it was tied around Harry’s wrists, in a very on the nose reminder of his uncle’s existence.

_Everyone is so desperate to prove themselves to me_ Harry snorted to himself, feeling himself disappearing back into the detached place within himself. Dear uncle’s voice caught him before he dropped, “We have fun. I _know_ we do. That’s why I don’t understand why you always have to leave, why you’re so afraid to stay; it’s either _this_ or it’s trying to die. It’s quite ridiculous, you know that right? You’re listening, right? I can feel your stiffness on the bed. I know you’re _there_... well, listen to _this_ , you’re not here for no reason. _I_ am not the only person in this two legged tango. It takes two to dance, Harry? And you’re _here_. What does that _say_ about you? It says you’re _here_ , it says you’re _staying_.”

Harry let his eyes close. He felt vibrations on the bed as his uncle crawled over. His hot moist breath against his ear caused his whole body to tense. “You’re _here_...”

_-of course, the only solace that existed was within himself. It was only simple math. To follow the winding path. To take note of what worked and what didn’t. The truth of the matter was simply that the outside world held no reprieve, only pain. In his mind, he could think of Jeff, he could think of cuddle fights and handball and playing magicians while the world spun around them both. He could imagine Dudley in his better moments, of flickering game consoles and the stray intelligent thought escaping the mind numbing nature of the electronic flashes. He could even think of his aunt, occasionally, sitting out in the peace of the garden, before she **knew** , preceding her definite discover, back when the open secrets were still partially hidden behind a wall of smoke, a wing of snow, a roof of dedicated shade. No winds blew here, no time passed, the world was at a pleasant cooling standstill-_

_Code Red._ In Harry’s time out the ghoul had gained a penchant for colloquialisms.

_Why then, Mr. Ghoul, do I not hear any sirens blaring?_ Asked Harry in the most sardonic voice imaginable, wishing for all the world that he could simply disappear back into nonexistence.

_Autopilot Failure_. The ghoul continued, as if Harry actually _gave_ a damn.

_Emergency Recovery._

_-and that was the beauty of a standstill. The world stood still. He basked in its entirety, in its calming presence, in the reality of silence. He world was a place of constant immovable chaos, yet inside this little dome of peace and serenity, Harry could escape such awful momen-_

“-makeup?”

Piers’ voice uprooted Harry from his firm handhold in tuning out planet Earth. He sounded and appeared the same as always, he was timeless; leaning back languidly like the confident arc of a wild cat’s back, as if to say _I know I’m dangerous_. The only evidence that time had passed, at all, was in the slightly increased angular nature of his face and motherload of freckles, his hair had also been hacked off, most likely by his aunt in one of her notorious “circus haircuts”. His mohawk sneered down at Harry, quite alike the hairstyle’s host.

_Danger_ said the ghoul, ever the joyful interrupter.

“Danger,” Harry drawled, pretending to still be playing the “read from script” game. He let the world swim around him, ready to faint or die or whatever this mysterious ailment may cause.

Piers scowled darkly, shadows cast along his face like strokes of a blade. _All carved up, beautiful_ Harry mused to himself, wishing he could wipe that roiling expression right off Piers’ face. “Not denying it, Potter. I always _knew_ you were as queer as fuck! Makeup, no wonder, no wonder...” The other boy trailed off, rage depicted with clarity inside every morsel of his entire body, as if he had been betrayed utterly and completely.

Harry blinked away confusion for a few infinitesimal seconds, before his eyes fell upon the dash of foundation that marked Piers’ shirt. He realised they existed in the masterbedroom, in front of the salon mirror. No doubt Harry had been covering up his aunt’s latest misdemeanours. Or were they his uncle’s? It was hard to tell the difference nowadays.

“Oh,” Harry snarl-laughed, shaking his head at Piers condescendingly. He’d probably only been hanging out with Dudley, reinstated as his best friend, and had only happened upon all of this by accident.

Piers’ eyes narrowed, “Got something to _say,_ Potter?”

Harry steepled his fingers, trying to impersonate his aunt at her most dangerous, and glowered from under long fitful bangs, “Just that you’re a fool if you think _this_ is what makes me a fag.”

_Danger_ the ghoul forewarned, like an alarm clock that _had_ been on snooze but resurrected just in time to make Harry’s life _hell on Earth_.

Piers’ face held no shock, he was as war weathered as any kid _could_ be without actually enduring a war. He’d seen it all. The polaroids hadn’t been his first foray into immorality and it showed by the dark wearied lines etched into his face. Piers fiddled with the door knob, suddenly ill at ease with Harry but trying desperately not to show it. He snarled, “Oh _yeah_ , I should have guessed, doing some other obvious gay shit have ya? Want to spill all, Potter?”

_Danger_ the ghoul thrummed and Harry kind of wished he could smack the mental figment around for a minute or two to teach it its place.

Harry’s smile was not friendly in the least. He dabbed his cheek with a piece of sponge right over where his jaw throbbed with a no doubt resplendent blossoming bruise. He did so with such oozing self assurance, possessing no fear for _Piers_ – a prepubescent urchin with blatant insecurities concerning his mother and grades and a right hook that couldn’t wipe the smile off a sobbing baby. Piers wouldn’t be able to even stomach _watching_ the Uncle Vernon Show, let alone participating. He was weak hearted, there was no cure for it. Only time would tell if he grew out of it. Being weak kneed was a bit like asthma, some left it in childhood and some choked from infancy to death bed.

He leaned back, meeting Piers’ eyes in the mirror. It felt a little as if the tables had turned and he had _become_ his dear Auntie. He was watching himself in Piers’ eyes, so it made it _okay_ to torture him a little. It was self inflicted, no harm in that. “You _really_ want to know?” Harry drawled, aiming for a Joker-esque grin, satirising the character that he recalled from long ago. Being the unconscious awake had certainly put a damper on following the Batman chronicles.

Piers was a child, truly, for he only _just_ refrained from eagerly helplessly nodding his head like he was bobbing for a golden fucking apple. Barely contained, his eyes lit up with intrigue, damning curiosity.

Harry settled the makeup sponge down on the dresser. He reached over for some remover. Hovering over his face, as if scanning for injuries, he picked a spot most likely the shade of jade he was looking for, and began to scrape away at the mask. At the first few strokes of his wrist, Piers looked deadly confused. It was almost comical to see his face change from vexation to an abrupt and startled form of astonishment, as if God himself had sauntered right up to Piers’ doorstep. Harry kneaded his jaw, head flashing for a moment – _Aunt Petunia, hair swarming up like medusa’s many snakes, shoulder rippling as the frying pan soared across the sky and made a graceful arc, heading right towards Harry like a deadly missile falling from he sky; there was no escaping the inevitable. Scrambled egg pan and naive face were always destined to marry_ – and revelled in Piers’ half-apologetic half-emotionally constipated countenance.

“I...” The boy began, obviously grasping at straws, “It’s not?”

_It’s not true?_ He was attempting to swallow.

Harry grinned a shark grin, sure that the splatter of ocean on his cheek only intensified the perilous feeling storming in Piers’ gut, “Sure is, bucko.”

The ghoul was silent. Harry wanted to tell it to shut up.

_-tum of life, he could evade the struggle of each cataclysmic tumultuous moment, by gliding on a sea of nothingness. It was as if he was lying in the dark staring at the ceiling with his eyes open, but it was so dark that his mind thought his eyes were closed instead. He was the walking undead, fathomlessly deceiving his mind to believe that this serenity wasn’t manufactured. He floated down a river of infinite softness, waves of gentle non-touching translucent caresses trailing through his hair and mind and everything, as if God herself was shining down from the heavens and blessing him with this fatally delicious vacuum-_

The sun was a single eye in the sky, a pinpoint glaring down at the group of raggedy Surrey-dwellers. Harry blinked the flintiness out of his mind, realigning his placement in the world; where his time travel had taken him this time. The boys languidly lied about, Dudley on the ground with his eyes shut soaking in the sweltering heat, Mark leant back on a beach chair most likely stolen from another local kid’s house, his hair splayed back as it grew out into a mullet, Piers sitting up, working his fingers as he whittled at a piece of wood, Harry, back against a tree, eyes suddenly alert.

It was a picture of peace, but if it had awoken him it meant a _bad thing_ had happened that he needed to be conscious for.

_Focus_ said the ghoul, acting as if Harry had always inhabited his body, pretending that he had never left in the first place.

Piers’ eyes narrowed and Harry spied the tension in his hands. The boy, mohawk now incrementally noticeably longer than the last time they had spoken (at least in Harry’s stunted recollection), groused in Dudley’s groundward direction, “I don’t see any of _you_ with a girl. At least I _have_ one.”

Mark snorted from his relaxed beach-chair pose, the only movement of his entire insensate body his mouth as if they all had been paralysed by the blistering heat of Summer. It was weird because Harry must have missed Spring entirely.

“ _Yeah_ ,” said Mark, entirely sarcastically, “Except your _girl_ is about as _girl_ as I am.”

Piers grinned meanly, “Oh Markina, I didn’t know you felt like a _girl_.”

Mark frowned, “Whatever. It doesn’t make you any cooler to have a girl. None of us do, and you didn’t until yesterday.”

Piers whistled, long and smooth and lowly, “Marky Marky naive Marky, I get it. You’re just not _man enough_ for the challenge.”

Mark growled, “Ugh, just shut your trap Piers!” The once relaxed boy raised himself from his pose into a sitting stance. He winced at a hit of direct sunlight into his eyes, and proceeded to glare at Piers with all his might.

Harry felt like munching on some cinema popcorn (his heart ached at the thought, since the only time he’d been able to indulge was visiting the cinema with Jeff), as this was prime time entertainment at its best. Dudley didn’t seem to share the opinion, as his eyes remained closed on the ground, as if he were sleeping. Judging on the irregular nature of his breathing, Harry was sure Dudley only _pretended_ to slumber. _Interesting_ Harry thought, eyes lifting from his cousin’s figure to the erratic argument that was beginning to escalate.

Somehow they’d moved to the topic of Harry.

“Unlike _him_ I have got _nothing_ to prove, so you’d be best to stop saying I’m a faggot or I’ll kick your head in!” Yelled Mark, heart boiling to the surface.

Piers’ lips lifted cruelly, as if he had tasted Mark’s point and found it wanting, found it rotten to the core, “No need for _threats_ Marky.”

“Stop calling me that!” The other boy screamed, fists clenched by his sides, fury exuding from him like waves of heat.

Harry wondered if he should intervene.

Piers made a very unconvincing peaceful gesticulation, before placating, “Now, I don’t know if we need to bring Potter into this...” His eyes met Harry’s, and Harry recalled Piers’ shock and horror upon seeing just one of his bruises.

Mark noted the interaction and his eyes opened widely, pointing frantically at the two of them as if he had struck _gold_.

_Danger_ said the ghoul.

The boy ran over to Dudley, shaking him “awake” (though Harry had reason to believe he’d never been asleep in the first place) and began to speak with great agitation, “These _two_. My fucking _god_. They’re both fags, Duds, it explains it all. I _knew_ something was wrong with ‘em. You’ve got to _do_ something.”

Dudley blinked wearily, most likely regretting his decision to accept leadership in this moment in time. He spoke slowly and carefully and Harry was reminded that he had been away from life for a long period of time, “Uh, Piers ‘lready has a girl... uh, whatcha expect from ‘em?”

Mark nodded, with just as much care and consideration, and suddenly his accusatory finger landed square in Harry’s face. “Him,” he said, “ _Potter_ needs a girl.”

Harry felt a little like being swallowed by the Earth. _Fuckity fuck._

**Chapter Four.**

Girls were strange creatures, Harry noted as he eyed the swarm of giggling mechanical beings that sat at the other end of his class. _Dull_ Harry thought as a brunet positively painted in her mother’s makeup smiled at him kindly from across the room. Ever since resisting “the fog” enough to design a scheme for his latest necessary action plan “get a girl” or GAG for short, Harry had started to take notice of his peers’ opinions on him; a critical part of GAG being acting as ‘his’ girl would prefer by knowing _what_ she would prefer.

The smiley girl appeared to be a cross between a clown and a Delphine Green wannabee judging by the sheer amount of makeup she had adorned herself with. She wore more than _Harry_ , and he was trying to cover up eleven years of abuse and degradation. _Try hard_ Harry sneered, as he winked in her direction. She seemed to be one of the many students in his year that believed in his “redemption”. St. Grogory’s grape vine possessed the delusional impression that he had “returned” to his old ways, assigning his falling grades to his “fixable” attitude. Honestly, Harry had just been trying to get through the day, but _thanks_ for that assessment. Really helpful, _yea-ah_.

Sarcasm intended.

It was a 50/50 split; half yearned for his redemption and for them to be the “golden girl” that induced such, and the other half desperately secretly adored his “bad-boy attitude”. Grease 2, although starring a nerdy male lead, hadn’t dissuaded the latest generation of giggling bimbos from searching for their own personal leather-jacket wearing, scowling, verging on criminal boyfriend. They’d reached _that age_ , and the latest _trend_ was fixing up broken kids like Harry for their own consumption.

With his wink, the dull-as-death brunet flushed a bright red and beamed back twice as hard. Dudley whistled from beside Harry, in the midst of actually attempting his math homework for once. It was stranger than the reality of girls, that Dudley wished to fix _himself_ , and had secretly begun to pine not for blonde brainless bimbos but for knowledge and a respectable place in society. He’d only shared this dangerous longing with Harry over popcorn and Batman comics whilst Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon had been out for “date night”; his aunt’s last desperate attempt to rekindle her husband’s affections.

Harry _loved_ date night more than anything in existence. He wished everyday could be date night. He adored it infinitively more than Christmas, Easter and all holidays combined; not that they had ever given him anything to look forward to anyway. Date night was a _whole entire never ending_ evening of reprieve from _both_ of his toxic guardians, and remained one of the few periods of time he could lift his fog inside the Dursley household. He spent the majority of his time hanging with Dudley, their “friendship” having recovered from his minor breakdown earlier in the term (minor as in not permanently life altering).

Dudley nudged him with a grin, momentarily taking his eyes off his maths, “I see Sally has the hots.”

_Danger_ said the ghoul, having become boringly monosyllable of late. Harry concurred with the beast in his brain, knowing intrigue from anyone held a whole host of hazards. Oblivious to his impending feelings of jeopardy, Dudley was duped by Harry’s saucy expression with little prompting, “She’s not the only one.”

The porky boy was hopelessly easy to manipulate; he’d most likely be extorted at multiple intervals in his life, as most soft hearted people were. Dudley simply bobbed his head in accordance and returned to chicken scrawled educational pursuits.

_Hurt or be hurt_ Harry affirmed to himself, gifting Sally with a crocodile smile and falsely warm eyes. _Whatever it takes_ he saw Piers glance at him from the corner of the room, and the boy, having seen beneath Harry’s veil, acted as if he knew exactly what was going through Harry’s head. Harry’s face twisted in warning and Piers ducked his face away, burying himself in school.

-o-

“Hey Harry,” Sally chirped like an annoying little plight of blue bird as she trailed after Harry at lunchtime. A wary Piers, an encouraging Dudley and a reluctant Mark left Harry to his own devices once they realised Sally was with him. He watched with envy as the three boys moseyed over to their next class, at the opposite end of the hall.

“Sally,” Harry wished her name wasn’t so dull and tasteless, “What’s up?”

The pretty girl seemed to sparkle with the somewhat positive attention directed at her. She twirled a long strand of butter brown hair around her finger as she responded, “Oh, nothing much, haha.”

Her giggle felt like claws down a chalk board and Harry wanted to sucker punch her. He smiled wanly, “Nothing but the sky, right?”

Sally laughed as if he had actually said anything of humour. Their next class neared and students funnelled through the door and into their seats. She awkwardly stood by the door, shuffling for a moment, before she asked, “Want to sit with me?”

Harry nodded, “Of course. I’d love to.”

Mark begrudgingly gave Harry two thumbs up as he sat next to Sally Shellberg. He felt almost vindicated, but then she opened her mouth again and that feeling dissipated like smoke.

_Kill me now_ Harry prayed futilely, eyeing the girl’s sparkling collection of rainbow colour-coordinated pens as if they were hazardous explosives.

-o-

“So,” said Sally as they sat together after school in the park. They’d agreed at meet up at Florence Park, since it was near enough both of their houses, and Sally had wanted to change out of her school regalia. In Harry’s opinion, the newest clothes were just as bland and unoriginal. In fact, the whole “date” had been boring, and the most interesting thing to have happened was when a stray swallow had ducked down and almost decapitated her. He’d felt robbed when it had missed and her subsequent shriek had indicated stubborn vitality.

“So,” Harry said and she broke out into giggles. Sally had this annoying habit of laughing at everything he said; he was starting to feel as if she wasn’t taking him seriously. At first, he’d just presumed she’d suffered a head injury, but upon considering this he supposed it might just be a failing of the female gender. His aunt had never been “giggly” but no other women had thrown fry pans at him, so perhaps she was an anomaly.

“Jinx!” Sally chirruped, as if Harry cared.

He smiled amusedly, hoping to pacify her, whilst praying for a second swallow with more gumption to come to his rescue. An awkward silence played out. Even the ghoul was quiet, as Sally was most definitely not a threat, and Harry, who usually cared little for small talk, would _die_ if she kept staring at him in silent unwavering adoration. Why was Sally so stupid and ridiculous?

“You look pretty, Sally,” Harry said, desperate for anything to say to salvage this. She was meant to be his GAG girl, and although she had him gagging with boredom, he needed this to work. Without his place in Dudley’s group, he’d be isolated from his cousin, and would forgo the security of an ally in the house. One could suppose that his uncle was an ally, but Harry wasn’t willing to part with the cost of _that_ friendship. Abused, maybe. Prostitute, no.

Sally, as expected, giggled. “Thank you, Harry! It’s my mum’s makeup.”

_I could have guessed_ he sarcastically drawled in his mind. “Well, you do look beautiful.”

All of a sudden, Sally went unpredictably silent. She became withdrawn and her face resembled something almost thoughtful. Harry wondered if she would finally show him a side of her that he could _like_ and _tolerate_ , something introspective, philosophical, or darkly callous. He hoped she was horrifically disfigured in some way and could provide him with _some_ form of entertainment.

Sally always managed to disappoint, it seemed. “It’s not at all right what they say about you, Harry. Here I thought you were a delinquent, but it’s just not true at all!”

_God, I hate her_ Harry thought.

He smiled thinly at her, but the mushy brained girl didn’t notice. His voice was brittle as he spoke, “Thank you, Sally.”

-o-

“I’m off to school,” Harry notified his uncle, staring blankly at the ceiling and saying the words yet not making any action that could be interpreted as leaving. Sometimes, in the quiet times when all logical thought ceased and the fog rolled over him like a moonlit bathing of light, he liked to count the tiles on the ceiling or play Tetris. The number never changed and the games grew old but the fog fixed boredom just as it fixed fear, and Harry was content with that.

“Have a nice day,” said Uncle Vernon, a digit still tracing down Harry’s shoulder. Who knew how far down it could reach? One day his uncle would hit rock bottom; the bedrock secreted away in Harry’s body. Would he keep digging then, or would he finally be satisfied?

“I will,” said Harry, still not moving. His body had apparently become paralysed. In apathy, perhaps, or simply obstinate unwillingness, he wasn’t sure. How quaint.

Perfectly civil, the finger politely excused itself. Harry thought it might be strange to thank an extremity, but still had to force himself into quiet. As he pulled himself upward, as if tugged by strings, his uncle leant forward and planted a single chequered kiss upon his cheek, “Stay out of trouble.”

That was Uncle Vernon code for ‘I love you’.

Love was strange.

It was not the type of thing to be verbalised, love.

Love was echoed in the things you didn’t say, in the actions and the intent behind such. Love was Jeff holding him, a brother in arms, swearing to place his life in peril for the single reason that he couldn’t bare Harry struggling alone. Love was the hooded look in Jeff’s mother’s eyes, as if the world was tilting too rapidly for her to tilt with it, as if all her regrets were swarming at her knees, drowning and dunking her, and she could do nothing to change it, nothing to change anything. Love was a cracked Nintendo lying on an old creaking floor, the whole room reeking of alcohol.

Of course, his aunt said the words. She was the type to do such, desperate enough to want to believe and delude and scrape honey from the deluge. She mimed the motions. She tugged his uncle’s tie from his neck, pulled him forth, pecked his prickled cheek and whispered, “I love you.” But, those were only motions, actions, an act for her to achieve. Aunt Petunia loved many things. She loved her house, her hair, her son, and her book club. Uncle Vernon? Not so much. But, she liked to pretend she did.

Everyone liked to pretend they did.

Love was one of those “common sense” mysteries. Harry half believed that no one truly knew what it was, that it remained just one of those things people spoke about vapidly. It was a grand conspiracy. Love didn’t truly exist, it was a phantom, a translucent message; people said they loved each other but in actuality they were only scared of being alone.

When Sally said she loved him, Harry parroted the words back to her. She blushed. She smiled, like summer rain and winter rainbows swirled together, sweet and perfect. But, it wasn’t love. It would never be. It was an impossibility; to love.

Harry wondered if his uncle would like Sally.

He pointedly squirmed at the closed doorway. His uncle liked to watch him fidget, to observe if he still possessed any pride that needed stamping out; so far all tests had concluded in the negative. Harry occasionally liked to believe that he still had some pride, deep down in an innocent place where the ghoul resided, in a well of bottomless strength and security, where his uncle could never touch. The ghoul, as if sceptical, remained ominously uninvolved, silent, detached.

Harry obeyed the silent instruction, his uncle’s tacit wish, as if he was a genie granting breathless hopes, a genie trapped and tortured in an oil lamp, “The door is locked, could I have the key?”

As a show of dominance the man took an obnoxious amount of time fetching the aforementioned item. His uncle stretched very slowly, as if he had no care that he would only perpetuate a negative spiral of tardiness. _Some people_ Harry mused _have no consideration for others_.

The key ring dangled from his uncle’s grasp, and the older man spoke in a way that Harry knew could only bring grievances, nonchalant and self aware, “Dudley mentioned you managed to get a girl.”

_Danger_ said the ghoul, as if Harry didn’t already _fucking_ know that.

_Shut up_ Harry growled.

_Focus_ the ghoul reminded, like a broken record, repeating forever endlessly. He’d been wrong; the ghoul was _nothing_ like Jeff and the sooner Harry assimilated such information into his system the sooner he could suffer _properly_.

“Her name is Sally,” Harry informed cordially, not even bothering to try and alter his inflection to rebellious or afraid or whatever his uncle expected. It’d make no difference either way.

Uncle Vernon’s crookedly furious expression let Harry know that he didn’t especially like Sally. The keys sliced open the left hand side of his cheek as his uncle threw them forcefully without concern for Harry’s wellbeing. Love hurt.

_I’m se-eeing a pa-attern_ Harry sang, walking sedately out the door with music dancing in his blood. The impertinent click of fingers in Aunt Petunia’s direction ended only with pain, but he couldn’t control the rhythm anymore than he could control his life.

_I’m a sla-ave to the mu-uusic_

The frying pan shaped dent on his forehead was worth it to see her disgruntled expression.

_I’ se-eeing do-ouble_

_But go-od knows I lo-ove you_

-o-

A train with no passengers was about as useful as train tracks rusted down to gored ground. The throbbing red swords of transport ran the engorged soil ragged, suffocating with disuse and neglect. Harry Potter had never visited this part of Surrey, the creaking abandoned bits where even the grey silhouette of sky above looked about two rides away from catastrophe. Mark liked to say it was cursed, that ghosts roamed the vacant crumbling chapels and stretches of empty road. Harry didn’t believe in m-word, however, such thoughts would only lead to his demise in the Dursley household; only fools would believe in curses or spectres, only dreamers.

He longed for silence. The peaceful nature of such and implied safety could only be uncovered in a cupboard, naturally. Yet, even his home beneath the stairs still oozed shame and secrets. It opened from the outside, after all, so the monsters could get in unburdened.

Standing on the tracks with wind-tussled hair, Harry narrowed his eyes in the direction of incoming transport. No one lived in the run down segments of Surrey, too afraid of ghetto ghosts who’d starved decades back, yet the runaway trains still passed through. Every hour on the hour, as the saying goes. He didn’t have a watch, never had and most likely never would, but Harry knew any distance from the top of an hour was barely any at all. Minutes were more slippery than one would expect; but Harry was well versed in patience, time travel too.

He stood, unflinching, his legs beginning to tremble as time went on as it was wont to. Was it playing chicken if he’d been there long before the train arrived? Was it playing chicken if he doubted he’d step away from hot metal and searing sinew, if excitement pounded his veins at the very thought?

_So-o lo-ong_

_I’ve waited so-o lo-ong_

Only fools believed in m-word. Only fools believed in heaven.

He’d made a deal with his uncle. Long ago, when time had been chronological still, and hope had existed in a dollop of mellowness, ever present, always waiting and patient. The deal had been an exchange of vestiges of sanity for vestiges of living; he’d agreed to stay living and his uncle had reciprocated with the words, “You can leave.” That was to say that he may fade into the nothing he had grown so reliant on. Yet, it was foolish to think such a deal would last the toils of time, as death was the only trump card, the only certainty. All other bargains quiver at the mere sight of death on their doorsteps.

Harry didn’t believe in the sanctity of marriage, of parent and child, or of the church. His uncle had been a fool to think he’d care for the sanctity of a promise; but perhaps he could be forgiven, Uncle Vernon was blinded by love after all.

The smell of a bereft train yard was similar to that of a disinfected kitchen or spilt wine and betrayed unconscionable thought; both steamed with solitude and emaciation. Wilted down and rocked to the bones that had once been his only reliance, Harry stared defiantly into his end, for the first time in forever becoming the wisher commanding the genie or the throwaway star up above. Blanketed in Surrey silken skies, the mooning sun laying itself to rest for another day, he spied with guile the incoming train’s bow.

He closed his eyes and held his breath, relishing in the tugging in his chest, the animal instinct that began to scrabble at his heels, the pulsing of the ghoul’s fear for even it desired to live and not die. He felt the rumbling of the train in his bared feet, soles attached to the cutting rust of the track, a roiling thunder coiling in this deciding moment. He could hear the momentum of it all, the coming to a head, the _thunk thunk thunk_ as the city train rolled on rotted destiny, on suburban misery, that which paved the way, and watched the entrenching snake entwine with a rhythmic ladder. The blackness from behind his eyelids began to glitter and he grew dizzy from the desperate survivalist _need_ to breathe, the train grew so close that he could feel its metallic moist smoky breath on the back of his neck, all his hairs stood on end, on pinpricks, all the goose bumps he had ever owned erected on every inch of his body, sudden all consuming instinctive terror grasped him and he opened his eyes, no eyelid visible, socket pressing up against his forehead, mouth beginning to open in the pretend picture of a breath, the twinkling lights of a train swooped in-

Hit by destiny, he would later call it, as a mass pummelled into him from the side and sent him flying into the air, out of the danger zone, out of the death grip of the train’s fury. He hit the old spoilt coals face first, splitting his lip, and the body over his own felt dense and stout, like flour filled bread that weighed a tonne yet was small enough to trick the gullible about its weight. He laid there, the guttural moans of the train screeching so deafeningly that his whole mind was awash with white noise for a split moment. It took far too long for the train to pass and the indented slices of coals to lift from his bedraggled form. The body toppled on top of him began to withdraw, and Harry flipped onto his back, staring at a dusty limitless sky.

“Who died and made you king?” He mouthed to himself, thinking it playing God to decide who lived and who died, _why save me?_ He barely whispered the words to the figure who’d caught him in a moment of triumph and surrender.

“Queen, more like,” The voice pounced from the shadows, not sounding remotely feminine nor regretful for their quick yet unappreciated save; as if they held no care for the foiling of his plans.

He let his eyes close, using the coals digging into his back as stability and the faintest wisps of transportive noise trailing away as a reminder to what he had gained and lost in that moment of vulnerability. The nameless person who had evidently saved his life did not bother speak further, and Harry’s left ear twitched with scarcely restrained instinct as the unidentified silhouette settled down next to him in a noisy orchestra of clanging stones.

_Focus_ said the ghoul from somewhere off in the abyss of his mind, but Harry had grown tired of listening to the same worn out song, so he ignored the pithy remark.

“Name,” He droned, face lax and expressive, like a polaroid absorbing shifting light fixtures, a vessel of reflective truth.

His saviour seemed hesitant, and Harry thought for a good hearty second that no name would be forthcoming before the silence was broken once again, “Aurora.” In a more placid a state of mind, he realised the voice was less of a human and more of an animal, a growl, a grumble, a warning signal. His body shrieked in flight or fight or floundering floozy-like ambience, but Harry let the instincts wade absently, giving no credence to the feelings. As a boy who had stood up to an incoming train, he wasn’t in the mood to give a damn.

“Mine is Harry, by the way. Not that you’d care, I’d expect.” He wasn’t the type to need silence filled, but tonight was a night where such quiet stillness harrowed him to his very core. He hated the hollow feeling of absence, of choking up dust and hiding; the night had never been an escape for him, not even from the Dursley prison yard, and he didn’t want it to become one in the wake of his narcissism.

“Self loathing, check,” said the voice. It was close enough now that Harry’s left hand side clenched; it could feel the aliveness emanating from right beside it, like a prey sensing a predator’s sprawling movements.

“You’re not the first boy to play chicken with a train,” it continued, as if Harry didn’t already know that. He hadn’t done it to be _unique_ for fucks sake. “And you won’t be the last.”

“No consoling from you then?” Harry snarked, a part of him loosening at the voice’s disparaging attitude. If it had begun to spout platitudes and well wishes he might’ve shoved them in front of the next train instead of himself next time one rolled by.

The voice snorted, gross and pig-like, like no girl Harry had ever observed. He really wished this person was a girl as they claimed so that the entire gender may seek its redemption. _This_ girl wasn’t _boring_. “It’s not like you asked if you could use my train yard for your suicide, don’t expect me to play nice.”

“I like you,” Harry admitted, confessing honestly in the security of darkness. This mysterious figure might never discover his true identity, might never reconcile Surrey’s most despised delinquent with a matter of fact voice of the night.

“Can’t say it’s mutual,” the voice responded. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but Harry liked to believe it had sounded softer in the wake of his profession; smoothed out. He liked to delude himself that he’d made a friend, someone willing to risk their life to save him; be it from himself or evil forces unknown.

-o-

“Where’ve you been?” A bereaved Dudley asked from atop his newest Batman and Robin bed covers. Harry suppressed a grin since new covers meant that he’d get the “older” ones, which weren’t old at all judging by his standards. They functioned, ergo they were perfect.

Through the slits of his eyes, dragged down by fatigue and the embracing chill of night, Harry watched silently as Dudley took a whiff of his collar. The boy’s nose scrunched; Harry smelt like ash and chugged smoke.

He mimed an old fashioned cowboy, swinging up onto Dudley’s bed and never letting his eyes stray from the chubbier boy. He pretended to tug a cigarette from his lips, knowing his cousin would be familiar with the action since Piers had recently taken up the bad habit himself. “Out,” Harry murmured, accent roguish and more Indiana Jones than anything.

Dudley tossed himself down beside him, his own eyes weary from a long day of doing nothing. He pulled at his own invisible smoke, his accent coming off as more realistic than Harry’s, “Outback, soldier? They’ve be getting bush fires in thou outback, soldier.”

Harry had to wonder where Dudley had gained this expanding vocabulary. Up until recently the boy hadn’t been aware that there _were_ any other countries than England, and now he commented on Australia’s politics like he’d been born and bred down under. It certainly hadn’t been Aunt Petunia’s well-read influence, since she’d been recently kicked out from the book club for the crime of “jealousy” (or not reading the material). Likewise, Dudley’s father knew less than Harry about affairs abroad from England, and he’d been too frustrated (most like sexually) since his wife had become a more common appearance around the house. It was a good time to be alive; Harry got to stand awkwardly yet with triumph in the kitchen flipping flat jacks whilst his aunt failed at seducing her husband.

She’d recently taken to wearing high coutour reading glasses, trying to play off a sexy librarian figure. Harry died laughing (of course after he was of ear shot, he liked all limbs intact).

Dudley hadn’t noticed Harry’s contention over his newly fathomed diction, and saw fit to spend moments in silence, staring at the array of glow in the dark stars blue tacked to the ceiling. Their original adhesive quality had faded years ago and all that kept them aloft was belief and industrial grade super glue – the blue tack was more for show.

“Keep your eyes on the stars and your feet on the ground,” he said, a sudden depth in his gaze.

Suspicion rising, ghoul absent, Harry asked, “Who said that?”

Dudley shifted on the bed, as if weighed down by a heavy secret, “No one.” His tone was more fragile than the longevity of peace. Explosion imminent, folks. Or implosion, at that.

“I missed you,” Dudley said into the dark. Harry’s face, tinged by the luminescent glow worm green of the stick-on stars, twitched in confusion. No answer flowed from him. He was choked. “I... ’m sorry ‘bout dad. ‘nd mum. ‘nd me. ‘nd, you know, all that stuff that we don’ talk ‘bout.”

Harry drew gentle shapes on his skin, tracing stars with the pencil of his nail, engraving a future into himself.

“One day,” Dudley heralded, his voice going low and fantastical, “There were two boys, one named Dude and one name Henry. ‘Nd one of the boys, Henry, lived in a cupboard under the stairs. Henry had to do chores, and wasn’t allowed to smile, and at night the big bad man who lived in their attic would come down the stairs and push dust in his eyes. Dude lived upstairs, above the attic, in the observatory tower, and he never saw Henry. The two boys, livin’ together, had never said a word to one another. It was a very lonely life for both, ‘cause of course neither had no friends, but one day Dude decided he’d had enough of staring at the stars. So, he walked down the stairs, all gentle like, so that no dust was pushed in poor Henry’s eyes. He moved about the house, surprised by how clean it was. Henry wasn’t scared of the dark, it was all he’d ever known, but he was scared of the light. So, every day that he did his chores, he closed his eyes. That fateful day, when Dude had escaped his tower, he came across Henry blindly cleaning. His lips were turned down in a frown. He was silent. Dude snuck up, wary of the new boy, but had left the stars for a reason. So, he tapped him on the shoulder, and in shock, Henry opened both eyes and both boys saw each other properly for the first time.”

Dudley’s voice petered off into sleep. Harry remained motionless on the bed, tip toeing off only after the gentle rise and fall of his cousin’s chest seemed immortal, and landed on a thick block on the ground. Internally swearing, as he’d stubbed his toe on some strange pointy object, a veritable death trap in waiting, he crept his way to the door. A column of artificial light from the hall slipped through and in a shard of pallor Harry saw them, Dudley’s most prized bounty, his most dangerous stash of jewels, that which would spell destruction for all and sundry; books stuffed under the bed.

-o-

Sally and school and it seemed everyone under the stars had been after him. His girlfriend had said they never talked anymore. The school said he needed to attend. His aunt and uncle didn’t say anything, but the heavy weight of their eyes as he made breakfast and dinner daily was a crucible on his heart. Dudley hadn’t asked after him, but that was the trend of those with their own secrets, they became too wrapped up in their own lives. It seemed that every time he breached the main road, walking down to the butchers to refurbish the grocery supply, eyes hung around his neck like a twisted set of fuzzy car dice. Surrey had become a town aware of him and his presence. He hated that slimy feeling as if his whole life were on television, gawked at by all.

Out in the train yard, however, his soul finally garnered some peace. Harry’s life had once more settled into a brand of equilibrium that didn’t revolve around his guardians or pretences. He hadn’t yet spotted the mysterious Aurora in the rubble, but every night that he returned and every day that he squandered there, this brutalised slither of hope burned a little brighter.

He wrapped his hands around his stomach, attempting to quell the knotted fist that grumbled there and wave of antsy excitement. Not one to indulge in positive feelings for the fear of their removal, Harry avoided this swarm of congested butterflies as often as he was able. Alas, life had never treated him fairly in the first place, and the pleasant curdle returned to remind him that he was alive.

The crunch of coals under his sandal shoes – borrowed permanently from a certain book hoarder – trailed behind him like the tune of a marching band. He strolled with the air of a soldier, _1 2 1_ tilting his head up and playing pretend in this ghostly place _1 2 1_ pretending that the sky didn’t cast long luxurious shadows that _1 2 1_ intensified his insides’ protests. Stepping over the tracks and knowing the time table well enough by now to not even look both ways, he came to his second step of exploration; the abandoned storage containers. So far, he had investigated seven from top to bottom, and today he entered the world of his eighth.

Eyes up, drum beating in his bones, and arms flat by either side of him, he marched past the other empty containers, not even glimpsing them in corner vision. His whole world narrowed down to the eighth, his purpose set.

_1 2 1_ He’d taken to counting or reciting in his brain due to the extended absence of the ghoul. With Aunt Petunia’s revived stay-at-home status, bonding time with uncle dearest had been drastically cut short, and the ghoul had left its hovel inside Harry’s brain as if it had never been there in the first place. In fact, Harry had been existing for Sunday Evenings for three whole weeks, a novelty that refused to sink in on the basis of it never actually lasting. Riding high on newfound freedom and a good mood a mile wide, he held the intention to visit every single inch of the train yard, if only for something to do.

Harry came to a halt outside of the mouth of the container. The scent of rotted metal and tepid paint gunk rolled out from the darkened space. The door, hanging on its final hinge, was easy enough to kick in with the right amount of repressed anger, and Harry revelled in the defiant shriek the entrance gave before it finally surrendered to his will. _One day, more than doors will give in to me_ Harry thought, not triumphant nor boasting, only as if he was foretelling absolute truth.

The interior of a train’s storage facility always appeared pretty much the same. A blurred hard-yellow number seeped off the right hand wall. The smell of old and dust and maybe death swirled in the nostrils of any unfateful explorer. Harry traced a finger along the wall, noticing a lack of grime or build-up. His finger came back clean and he furrowed his brow in perplexity.

Once his eyes cleared and he saw into the room, Harry paused, breath suspended in the air as if hanging from a tight rope from the clammiest of pinkie fingers. This was not only the eighth storage container, this was Aurora’s storage container, and he saw the proof as clear as day break; the dirtied fetid water-soaked evidence of human inhabitation.

As he stared at the towering piles of thrown away books, shoved into the corner against perspirating metal like a dirty secret, he thought of the secret stash of literature under Dudley’s bed and his own place of peace in the library. Maybe they should all start a book club and spill their sorrows over the covers of classics. Maybe they were all just as lonely as one another, drowning in books and pithy problems. Maybe beneath an infinite sky with stars that remained fixed for all of them, there was some defining thread that linked them all, connected them.

_Or maybe this goes to show that books do jack shit, for no matter how many we read we’re still stuck in our hell-hole lives_.

The noise of feet on metal sounded from behind Harry, and he turned around, knowing his nails were sharp enough to rip through veins if need be.

“There’s no honour in that kind of death,” Aurora said, illuminated by natural light from the outside. She was nothing like Harry had imagined her.

He scrunched up his lips, “Well, you almost died _too_ , so, you can’t really speak.”

Her eyes were condescending, as if what he had said only reinforced her point, “Except my death would have been attempting to save another’s life. There is honour in that, soulfulness.”

Aurora stepped forth, out of direct sunlight, and Harry’s brain processed her appearance; everything he had wished for and more. Her plastic face caught him and trapped him, he was at its mercy, helpless and unable to look away. Aurora, the walking horror, forced him to imagine what awful happenings must have occurred to misshape her entire countenance in such a way. Harry imagined that she had perhaps been sewn into a trash compactor, grinded down into a sticky pulp, and rebuilt in the image of marvellous grotesqueness. Her cheek bones were high and defensive, like sky-reaching walls of a castle or the blue glow of a moat’s riverbed. Her eyes were the colours of far away stars, crystallised jewels encased unnaturally in a form of humanity; he thought how heinous a crime it would be to steal the very stars from the sky and replace a baby’s eyes with them. Her mouth as a permanent snarl, an animalistic growling sprawling movement, and her body was short and stumpy, as if one had condensed her down into bite sized pieces, ready-to-eat. Yet, beneath this strange and eerie plastic mask, these eyebrows drawn on wrong and fangs gravitating towards him, Aurora embraced the ugliness; she set her mouth into a permanent voluntary howl, her eyes twinkled with malice and the promise of pain, her face showed no sympathy.

She didn’t bother to soften herself for him, to tenderise the sharp edges and make smooth. Aurora was a canvas of pre-emptive hatred, as if she had taken one glance and measured every person in the entire universe imbecilic. Her roiling fury was set in advance.

“Unlike you, I _have_ a soul,” Aurora growled, setting herself down on a dry spot on the floor. The container creaked as she leaned back, and the monstrous girl brought out a thick tome. She licked her digit and thumbed it open, dismissing Harry from this scene of theirs.

Harry picked up a heavily annotated bible, flicking through the pages as Aurora lingered at the edges of his sight. Uncle Vernon would have his hide if he’d defiled a book like this. He’d be nothing more than a quivering pile of red flesh at the end of it. His eyes roved Genesis, trying to look past the scribbles and find the words.

“Genesis 1:3 to 1:5 states And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day,” Aurora said, eyes not breaking from her reading, words humming over Harry as if they were more music than knowledge. “In the literal interpretation that would mean God made day and night on the first day, yet Genesis 1:19 states And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Contradiction, no?”

Harry drew a finger down the raggedy book, thumbnail catching at the creases and indents. He tongued the side of his mouth, brow scrunching, “Why read it if you think it’s wrong?”

Aurora didn’t bother to meet his eyes. To the outside observer she would seem completely immersed in Alice In Wonderland, yet her words still flowed without pause nor contrition, as if she had anticipated the question, as if she too practiced conversations in the dead of night with palms on her stomach staring at the midnight inside her cupboard, voice hidden by the tinkering of rats, “I appreciate the text, but when I see something as wrong I mark it down. That’s all.”

“You’re dangerous,” Harry mused, no ghoul there to tell him so, placing Aurora’s bible at the very top of the faltering pile of literature.

Aurora remained silent for long halting moments, “Thought is dangerous.”


End file.
